


Forged to Survive

by Neocolai



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: #healing water fixes everything, Angst, Azula is evil, Discontinued Work, DragonWing!Zuko, Earthbenders are the real bad guys, Fire Lily Zuko, Gen, Hurt Zuko (Avatar), Iroh is the best uncle, MuffinLance inspirations, THERE BE SADNESS YOU WERE WARNED, Tui and La will fish slap the Fire Nation, Whump, Zuko is a sad turtleduck, and also a little more broken, but some happiness if you squint, fine there's fluff everywhere it's still sad, freedom fighter zuko, freedom fighters dominate this fic, mute!Zuko, pairings what pairings it's a whumpfest not titanic, photosynthetic!Zuko, shirshu paralysis, zuko can never be good
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-30
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:15:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 31
Words: 77,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24451225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neocolai/pseuds/Neocolai
Summary: Oneshots that wouldn't get out of my brain, mostly AU’s centering around Zuko.  (Warnings in notes for each chapter)(Freedom Fighter AU is discontinued)
Comments: 191
Kudos: 681





	1. Arrhythmia

**Author's Note:**

> Another nod to MuffinLance, who has ruined me for Turtleduck!Zuko forever. If it looks like MuffinLance, it's probably garnered from one of her fabulous stories. (Like the rabbit mice, and... Azula in general.)
> 
> (Insert Disclaimer /Neocolai does not own anything/ here)
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: Character Death (implied), implied Violence

_It’s warm in the courtyard. Sunny. Nice. He can hear the turtleducks, but there’s no more bread in his pockets, so they don’t stay. They’ll come back tomorrow, though. For now he rests his head against the tree and closes his eyes._

_For a few minutes, locked in his own self-imposed darkness, he can imagine that he’s warm from the inside out._

* * *

Zuko isn’t aware of much when the crown is pinned to his sister’s hair. Later he finds out that he lost twelve days. Drenched sheets too hot and close against his skin, bitter herbs poured between his teeth, lightning driving between his temples, heat pulsing even when he closed his eyes, fire interchanging with ice as his tingling hands slowly went numb.

The Avatar is dead, they tell him. It seems that when the Painted Lady burned, he lost all hope.

It’s only a stroke of mercy that he took Ozai with him.

Azula, at least, doesn’t cup her hands in flame every time the servants displease her. She laughs giddily and stages executions that she calls off at the last minute because there’s some use for the rabbit-mice and she doesn’t waste resources. Zuko’s pretty sure his usefulness ended when his flames died, but Azula keeps him around anyways. She almost sounds disquieted when he can’t keep his eyes open during supper, or when he sits down in the middle of the hall because he _just. Can’t. Breathe._

“Don’t be such a baby, Zuzu. I made Shigeo vow you would live. You wouldn’t want to waste all his hard work, would you?”

No, he wouldn’t, because they’re going through physicians too quickly and Azula banished three of them last month, but their pungent remedies and thick syrups can’t stop the blackness in his vision when he sits up for too long, or the seizing in his chest when he realizes Mai hasn’t been around in two days _(_ why didn’t he notice she's always there?) and then again because she’s fine it was just Azula in his head (and then she sounds disquieted again, like she’d never banish someone who could make her brother squawk just by vanishing). The physicians can’t stop him from shivering every time there’s a draft, or settle his stomach when the chef forgets and serves roasted pork (the smell, he can’t — he just _can’t_ and Azula gets that _look_ when he bends in half, quivering hot and cold when he remembers blue eyes and raw screams), they can’t make him sleep when every time he closes his eyes he sees a blind girl turn her shoulder in reproach, they can’t make him feel the sun when it doesn’t shine directly on his skin ( _oh Agni,_ he can’t even remember how that felt anymore, his hands are always cold), they can’t put strength in his legs or fire in his heart, and Azula keeps bullying them to try something new as if one day a scowling old man with a long beard will perform a miracle with black magic. (Because there won’t be a Waterbender in the Fire Nation again; not for sixteen more years, when they’ll awaken to warships and re-purposed steel and an ocean closing in over their heads.)

No one can fix Zuko. But sometimes he goes to the one person who doesn’t try. He always makes it on his own, just far enough to prove that he can do it, before he drops the crutch and collapses, sobbing, begging forgiveness because he couldn’t stop it, he didn’t listen, he tried and he failed and it’s his fault for everything.... He never gets past the first apology before Uncle tenderly gathers him up, embracing him through the bars like it wasn’t Zuko who messed up and left him here forever, like he doesn’t notice that his nephew can’t hold on quite as tightly, like everything would be right again if the Blue Spirit could put on the mask one more time. Then the moment ends (hours, days later, he never knows, sometimes he doesn’t realize how long it’s been until the guard is shaking him awake), and he’s carried back to his room, where he’s ensconced in blankets and plied with hot tea, and the blazing fire never seems to help his aching legs.

“You do this to yourself, Dumdum,” Azula scoffs, but she looks sullen in the shadows by the hearth and she doesn’t snicker and snatch the blankets away when she leaves this time. He huddles in anyways, waiting for the cold.

The breeze doesn’t feel too chilly, under his tree by the pond. It’s quiet. Nice. The stillness is a peaceful sort. No voices break into his thoughts, and he could almost forget the guards are there, always present and somber, never speaking to him. They’ll bring him inside when the shadows grow too long. He left his crutch somewhere out of reach, but he doesn’t think he’ll need it for much longer. His legs don’t hold out for long walks anymore. Azula’s screaming and the physicians’ remedies can’t hold off the inevitable. He thought it would’ve been nice to stand before the new Avatar. To ... to apologize for everything he had done. Every failure. Every brutality dealt by his nation. He would've liked to have said _"I knew him,"_ before the end came.

 _He doesn’t expect to see the final invasion, or feel the water build up and soothe his aching chest and numbed hands, while the new Avatar weeps for what was lost, and for the memories of the past that are now her own._ _He doesn’t expect to live, for the guards who carried him to the turtleduck pond to bring him to the council table where everyone is waiting for him to speak. He doesn’t expect to hobble to the family shrine with only a hand on his aide's shoulder, where he can finally pay his respects to Uncle alone, in the peace of an autumn afternoon. One day he won’t feel so cold inside, but that day is far ahead._

For now, the sunlight is warm, and behind his closed eyelids he’s riding alongside an Airbender and listening to Katara laugh.

It’s a nice dream.


	2. Bars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They keep him alive. That's their first and final error in judgment.
> 
> (In which a newly crowned Fire Lord needs rescue, and does not expect it.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Graphic Violence (implied). Very Dark

They keep him alive. That’s their first mistake.

He waits until the guards are swaying, one hour before the change in shift, and sets the room alight. That’s his last mistake.

They don’t heal him properly, but they don’t torture him, either. There’s an old woman with brisk but kind hands who pushes bits of shattered bone into place and rubs his hands every hour with something numbing and minty until he stops rocking himself in a stupor. They bring him food, and when it appears that starvation is preferable to hand-feeding or lapping the plate like a dog, they find alternatives. (He can still hold a bowl. His arms shake and he spills most of it, but he manages it by himself.) There’s a bed, a chair and a desk, with paper and useless pens that he can’t grip and noncombustible ink (as if he hasn’t learned his lesson). He slowly accustoms to reading by crystal light instead of candles. There’s even an open wall, where for a few hours a day he can follow the morning sunlight. (There’s never enough heat to warm the bars that he sits against, but that would make them too personal. As if at any moment he could find comfort in the golden rods that surround him on every side.)

He has company, when he permits it, and he can choose to send them away. There's the old woman who kneads his hands with nightshade balm when the stiffness wakens him long before sunrise. The shy child (he can’t tell if it’s a girl or a boy — he never asks) who brings clean sleeping robes that he can slip into without fumbling with any ties. The servants who dress him in red in the morning and brush his hair into a topknot, as if he needs to be reminded of where he belongs, and to where he will never return. (They never talk about anything that takes place outside of his room; his four walls; the patch of sunlight overflowing from a tiny, walled courtyard. There was no war in Ba Sing Se. There isn’t a world outside his cage, either.) There’s a scribe who comes inside daily, with a twisted goatee and a robe like a forest nomad’s, who reads folklore and playwright, history and philosophy, anything that passes the time, even if Zuko is too weary and battened down to engage in political debate.

There’s hardly anything worth arguing for, anyways.

He doesn’t ask what they want with him. The answer was obvious enough when they sent Earthbenders in red helms (armor his own guards would have supplied), to a moonlit pond (any hearth sweeper could guess where to find him), through passages only the servants frequented. The Fire Nation never wanted a boy king. _(Flashing granite flecked with red, he stares at the bits of white jabbing from his wrists before **agony** blots his vision.)_ Now they’ll never ask for one.

He pried them with questions, at first. Uncle. The Avatar. Azula. Hesitantly, _Mother_. The servants were chosen for their subtle art in changing the subject (and their apparent ghostlike qualities whenever he stopped _breathingnotgaspingnotcrying_ long enough to realize they’d quietly slipped away). Enough diversions, and he stops pressing for news. Uncle wouldn’t abandon him here, but if he doesn’t _know_ , then Zuko might as well be dead again, blown through the window of a flaming ship. Being forgotten isn’t a new insecurity — it’s wondering if there will be anyone to return to that leaves him gasping into his knees as he cradles his ruined hands to his chest.

_ An empty teacup, a new urn in the family shrine, a portrait shadowed in memory, a pai sho board still laid out, waiting for the players to finish the game.... _

One day it’s all too much and he lashes out, kicking and roaring and incinerating everything within reach of the dragon's breath.

They don’t chain him away, or muzzle him, or break his legs. He doesn’t know if this pretense of ignorance is better, or if it terrifies him. He wakes from a drugged stupor with a wooden bed, a desk and a chair, and nonflammable ink as if nothing happened.

He realizes at that point that they’re not going to kill him. He’ll stay in these stone walls, barred by chains of gold, until he loses his mind or strangles himself, whichever comes faster. (He can’t bring himself to do it, even when he entertains the notion of just not troubling to eat when the tray is brought in. He just... can’t give up. Can’t bend his own will to give in. So he resigns himself to enduring forever, until illness or senility sets him free.)

His hair grows longer, until he shivers and reminds himself that he doesn’t look like — will never be — _isn’t_ his father. He tries hacking it off the next day, using a wooden slat broken from the chair. They replace the furniture without comment, and he’s left with uneven strands poking out of his topknot.

_ (Now he knows how Azula felt.) _

He’s accepted it will be this way... forever... until it comes as rather an alarm one morning when his puddle of sunlight shivers and the floor trembles underneath him. Clapping sandals and shouts suddenly reveal that there are halls on three sides of him; people going in and out all the time that he’s never seen, let alone recognized by task, and he can only wonder dully if there’s an earthquake and he’ll be buried in this golden room, never to feel the sunlight again.

The floor recoils beneath him again, and the running footsteps are softer and shorter in stride. There’s a rattle, like someone ran straight into the golden lattice in their haste, and he doesn’t know what to say when the shy child peers inside.

Only, he thinks he may be losing his mind for certain, because it’s not the child whose hands grip the bars... it’s Toph.

His throat does something, (he doesn’t even know what that sound **_is_** ), and it shakes the little Earthbender enough that she screams and stamps, rattling the entire cell. Stone fragments dust Zuko’s hair and the golden bars rupture, peeling aside like paper curling under a flame. He wants to get up, he wants to beg that it’s really her, he wants to yell at her to run because there are too many of them and they won’t kill him, he knows this now, but they may not have second thoughts for a child and she can still escape if she leaves him here — and then he can’t breathe past the arms around his waist and he tries to brush against her headband, to convince himself she’s really there, but needling fingers latch around his wrist and Toph suddenly goes quiet.

Traces the knobs where bone ought to be smooth.

Feels him snatch back because it’s been months but exposed nerves _don’t heal on their own._

“I’ll kill them,” Toph whispers, like she doesn’t have the voice to express what’s writhing inside. "I'll kill them if Sokka doesn't."

Zuko... doesn’t know how to answer that. He doesn’t care if Toph crumbles the entire Fire Nation Capital or if she closes her eyes to the cell like he's burned yet another chair. He doesn’t want to know what it means yet; the running, the panic, the gale outside like there’s an Airbender wrecking havoc. He seizes Toph as best he can, winding his wrists around her narrow shoulders, and buries his face in her neck.

Just holding. Hoping. Resigning himself to the knowledge that he wasn’t forgotten, that he's finally coming to the end.

The Earthbenders leave him alive. That’s their last mistake.

Cool water soothes the ache in his hands, and he can bend his fingers without pain.

It’s the first of many beginnings.


	3. Circumvention (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zuko runs away before Ursa can confront Ozai. Months later, Jet finds a Firebender in a field.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: implied Violence

  
  
It’s been three years since the Fire Nation attacked. Three years on his own, scoffing at outstretched hands and taking what he wants because all the rich snobs offer is the scraps from their plenty, and that’s not enough for all the kids who cluster in the alleyways. Three years of bluffing his way into caravans, hostels and hearts, until the smile freezes on his face and it’s natural to pull out an old lie for a new face. Three years of running from the yellow eyes until they give up searching, and then tying pig bladders stuffed with blasting jelly around the camp.  
  
(It’s a dare, at first. Use the Fire Nation’s flames against them. He slits the throat of a man writhing without his legs and doesn’t sleep for four days.)  
  
It gets easier. He’s kind, putting them out of their misery quickly. He’s gentle, tucking his kids behind him so they don’t have to do the worst parts. He’s generous with their findings, always leaving essential supplies in the villages they pass. Food. Bedding. Sometimes soap or tins of spices. Luxuries in ramshackle buildings half-scorched by Fire Nation soldiers.  
  
The yellow eyes don’t deserve mercy. He gives it anyways; a clean death. Most of them don’t wake up when he blasts their camp or slips past the perimeter, disposing of the watchman first before slitting throats. Quick and easy. Painless.  
  
“Jet.”  
  
They’re in a field. A sun-beaten, shriveled rice paddy that’s sprouting more wild grass than edible grains, and Longshot’s tone holds all the ill boding of, _There’s something here you’ll want to finish off._  
  
Fire Nation again. Probably cut down a poor man in the middle of harvest. The sun’s hot enough — all they’ll probably do is bury a body. Show some basic respect.  
  
Longshot actually kneels as Jet approaches, prodding the body over instead of nudging it with one foot. He flinches, and Jet sees why instantly.  
  
It’s just a kid. All narrow shoulders and twiggy wrists, sunken cheeks and shoulders scratched by curious ravens. The hair is long and flimsily tied, like it could be a phoenix tail ( _Fire Nation,_ Jet’s instincts scream) but the kid is too young to know how to fix himself up without a mirror.  
  
“Boots,” Longshot comments.  
  
They’re scored and peeling at the heel, the black luster faded to grey, but the pointed toes are irrefutable. Jet peels one sunburned eyelid back and glimpses washed-out gold. His hands gather into fists.  
  
“Heatstroke,” Longshot guesses, pressing a hand to the reddened throat. It looks like he could break the kid’s neck just by pressing down, the skeletal frame is so prominent. “Long way.”  
  
Monosyllables speak volumes, if used properly. The kid’s Fire Nation, all right. Far from home, if his fancy boots testify anything. No caregiver; there are too many sores and scratched insect bites, and he’s losing more hair from ripping out the tie than what is falling out from starvation. Whoever he is, he’s been wandering long enough that one more step was just too much. It’ll be an act of kindness to kill him now.  
  
Besides, Fire Nation toddlers grow into soldiers.  
  
“Young,” Longshot points out. It’s a quiet plea, spoken with action and not tone. He’s cupping the kid’s head, already reaching for the water skin at his belt. (There’s a knife right beside it, but Jet knows his kids. If anyone’s going to do it, it’s got to be him.)  
  
“He’s Fire Nation,” Jet states. “Probably a Bender.”  
  
“Useful.”  
  
Jet blinks, trying to unhear that word. “He’ll be nothing less than a spy — first chance he gets he’ll run off to the nearest outpost.”  
  
Longshot shruggs, thinking about it. He streams water over the kid’s cracked lips, humming a pleased little note when the heat victim stirs and sighs, swollen tongue lapping to catch the trickle. “Small.”  
  
Growling, Jet turns around, facing the direction they came from. A faint haze drifts from the ransacked camp two miles down. Kid is too worn through to have come from that way, but he’s still Fire Nation. “We’re not adopting him.”  
  
“Why.”  
  
Jet whirls around and scowls. The kid is half lying in Longshot’s lap now, squinting like a newborn rabaroo. He probably isn’t aware of anything besides the water Longshot sloshes over his face and hair. Sun blindness might be a problem, too. They’ll have to carry the little sparkshooter back to camp.  
  
“He’s too dangerous,” Jet decides. “A firebrand loose in the middle of a drought? If we’re lucky he’ll just burn some poor farmer’s harvest.”  
  
Stilling the boy as he struggles, awake enough to realize he’s lost and caught by unfamiliar hands, Longshot looks over the dry paddy and back to the kid’s swollen fingers. “No fire here.”  
  
“There will be,” Jet assures him.  
  
Sliding off his hat, Longshot ties it securely around the boy’s chin.  
  
No. No, no, and no. “He’s not coming with us,” Jet says between gritted teeth.  
  
“No family,” Longshot hazards.  
  
“Yeah, they’re probably back there,” Jet guesses, nodding to the razed circle of red tents. “You think it’s smart, having a vengeful little short fuse in the camp?”  
  
Longshot merely bobs his head. Stands up and backs away a step, waiting. Rolling his eyes, Jet releases his swords and stoops down, slinging the kid over one shoulder. (He really is just a sack of bones.)  
  
“We’re not keeping him,” Jet warns. “First spark I see, we finish him.”  
  
Longshot beams.  
  
Jet will repeat his promise that evening, when Pipsqueak half-smothers the shrimp and Smellerbee comments that if not for the ribs poking out, he’d probably look closer to Jet’s age. He grabs for his hook swords the moment the kid sneezes and the fire pit hiccups. (Longshot, it turns out, is quite adept at stepping just into someone’s way until Jet trips over his feet and falls down long enough to be lectured by _all_ of his kids.)  
  
In the morning, yellow eyes tear up in a red, blistering face and Jet presses scabbing hands down long enough that he can smear aloe and honey over the burns. He grumbles over the whispered “ _Thank you”_ and leaves to hack at something that won’t bleed red.  
  
By evening the kid is hobbling around on his own, tripping over everything and drinking water like he needs to replenish a small lake. Quick recovery for a brat with heatstroke.  
  
_Firebender_.  
  
“You have to make the choice,” Smellerbee warns Jet that night, when the kid is just a lump curled as tightly into himself as he can manage. “Once the others get attached they won’t let you. It has to be tonight.”  
  
Huffing, Jet winds his fingers behind his head and stares up at the stars. He has a knife. It’s quiet. The kid won’t feel anything.  
  
“You think he ran off on his own?” Smellerbee wonders. “What’s a Fire brat got to be scared about?”  
  
Manipulative little spider wasp. Puffing between his teeth, Jet rolls onto his side, putting his back to the fire. And the kid who’s curled way too close to it, for being a heatstroke victim.  
  
The kid tried to bolt, when he first woke in the camp. Dazzled and confused, writhing when Pipsqueak caught him and brought him back. There was a name accompanying that plea. Familial. It curdled Jet’s stomach.  
  
He still doesn’t like the implications.  
  
“Does it look like I care?” Jet grumbles, thumping the cloak under his head. “Don’t blame me when he sets the camp ablaze.”  
  
He can feel Smellerbee smile, and he knows he’s missed his chance. The kid’s good to stay until he first starts the fire without a sparkrock and has to be tracked down by Longshot and dragged back under promises that he’s not going to be gutted just because Jet jumped three feet and nearly impaled himself on his own swords. Then there’s the instance when they’re ambushed by professional bandits and Jet forgot to give the kid a knife but the kid just punches and the guy holding his ponytail falls back with a blackened face. (They drag the him back to camp again. Because. This is going to be normal.)  
  
Jet doesn’t sleep well at night, anymore. Neither does the kid. There’s too much whimpering and looking over his shoulder, like something worse than a hooked sword is coming after him. There’s a difference between running and being pursued. Firebending brats shouldn’t be on the other end of it. It’s just not natural.  
  
It makes it harder to draw a line.  
  
The line smudges irreparably when Fire Nation soldiers find them. There’s no light of reunion in any yellow eyes. The kid flings up a hand with a desperate, shaky flame and the soldier looks like he found a scorpion in his boot. There’s fire and singed hair and _screams,_ and when it’s over and there’s a hook sword buried in the soldier’s neck and Jet’s ordering the kid to _breathe_ while small, pale hands clutch the scorched ends of a shortened ponytail, all the kid can whisper between chattering teeth is, “Father wants to kill me. He’ll kill me. She wasn’t lying.”  
  
Jet doesn’t know what they do to their kids in the Fire Nation. He doesn’t want to know what messed up generals carry orders to hunt down a missing prince. He does mark that it’s been a year since they carried the kid out of a field. Long enough for him to show his true colors. Long enough for the others to get attached.  
  
It’s time to make his decision.  
  
Jet waits until the kid is asleep before wadding up the wanted poster and tossing it into the fire pit. Bares his knife. Approaches soundlessly. Longshot stiffens, but he won’t stop him. They all know what tonight’s attack means for their future.  
  
One neat slice, and a handful of uneven, silky black strands flares in the pit and vanishes. The kid might not like it short, but he’ll stay alive longer if he doesn’t stand out.  
  
“Li,” Jet announces, sitting down crosslegged across from their newest member. “His name is Li. Forget anything else he told you.”  
  
Somberly Longshot nods. He tucks himself against the kid, guarding his back. Smellerbee keeps watch on their right. Pipsqeak is snoring off to the left.  
  
Jet places his swords within arm’s reach and flops down, thumping the cloak under his head.  
  
The kid’s in good hands.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	4. Drag Race (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jet isn't worried at first when Li disappears. Then he hears the soldiers' laughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: General Violence

Gaipan is a quiet village. Filled with Firebenders. Jet's hands twitch, but Li gets _twitchier_ when children are running around so Jet preoccupies himself by sniffing around for the fattest purses. If he can't "liberate" the town the easy way, he can at least start by relieving a few bowed-back soldiers of their pilfered profits. It's a compromise — until nightfall, at least. Once Li falls asleep; that's when they all get to work. (It's a bizarre routine, but it's worked for three years, ever since Li walked in on a Fire Nation camp just as Jet finished coating the last bedroll in scarlet and Pipsqueak had to squash their newest member until Jet could promise ( _lie_ ) that he recognized the more honorable path and it would never happen again. Li is... sensitive.) 

Today will be a quiet day, because Smellerbee needs things that Jet never wanted to know about and Li must absolutely not know about ( _ever_ , because then it will be Jet's responsibility to explain where small children come from and that is not a conversation he hopes to live through), so while she does her womanly shopping it's Longshot and Jet's duty to steer Li towards the more typical necessities: new rope, oiled tarps to replace the rags they've been using to protect the supplies, waxed cord for arrows, and green vegetables since Smellerbee gets absolutely cranky when she starts running low on.... (Okay, one more thing that doesn't need to be implied in front of Li. Just finish the list and get the kid out of town.)

Jet isn't worried at first when he realizes that Li isn't behind him. The first time this happened, he found Li in a swords shop and they had a proper lesson about _liberating_ rather than wistfully rubbing the last copper bits in an empty purse. The second time involved quacking, tortoise-shelled fluffy things that were not permitted to take residence in Li's bedroll, even if he looked like they were long-lost siblings. The third time... well, that was the first time he actually _disappeared_ and was found in a skunk bear trap miles from where he said he would be exploring, so it was probably time to call in Pipsqueak and round up the little sparkshooter.

That’s when Jet hears the laughter. It’s rough, soured by fire-scorched throats, and too loud to be coming from just a few scouts. He starts running, because _Li_ is here and he doesn’t know when the kid declared war against the Spirit World but bad luck’s followed him around ever since.

Thunder fills Jet's ears and he dives out of the way just in time to avoid the crushing feet of a komodo rhino. He doesn’t see it through the dust, but suddenly Longshot is at his side, shaking him and yelling louder than Jet’s ever heard in his life. His ears tune in to _“They got Li!”_ and dread puts fire into his stride.

The Freedom Fighters have spent their whole lives running, but they can’t keep pace with a beast spurred by a hot fist to the flank. Jet can just see Li on the other end of the tether and _Vaatu_ , they’ve got the chain around his neck and he’s hanging on for dear life with hands that will be raw and blackened with bruises come morning. Jet shoves a woman out of the way, ignoring the startled tutting as her basket of eggs splatters against the next market stall, and immediately he has to dodge a man peddling trinkets blessed by the fire sages. There’s too many people in the way, all at once. A quick glance at Longshot and they both take to the roofs, lunging across the gaps faster than if they had a real Earthbender paving them a causeway. It’s still not fast enough and Jet can imagine Li’s grip slipping, the bruises around his neck, the pants for air that will vanish because this is a hanging and there isn’t any snow to bring down the swelling and he’s going to hold one of his kids while he dies —

Pipsqueak steps out of nowhere. Plants his feet. Punches out in a move so grounded and fancy that he had to have picked it up from watching Li’s sunrise routine. The blow catches the komodo rhino dead in the forehead, and even as the enraged beast knocks Pipsqueak aside Jet can see it stagger.

The fractional delay is enough. Jet doesn’t think, just spins on his heel and flings one of his hook swords. It plinks through a chain link and drives into the ground, snapping in half just as the chain pulls apart. Komodo rhino keeps running, and Li lies still in the dust.

Pipsqueak is there first, with Longshot pushing him aside to inspect the damage. Jet shoves past them both.

Golden eyes are wide and glazed, too dilated to express terror. There’s gravel embedded in Li’s hands but when Jet tries to pull the chain away Li kicks at him and gasps desperately, like he knows it’ll start all over again and he’s not going to have enough air for the next round.

Longshot is crying.

They try to be gentle. Smellerbee smooths Li’s hair back, whispering reassurances that might as well be another language for all her stammering. Pipsqueak holds him down while Jet attacks the iron collar with a file. It’s clear from the dilated pupils that Li’s not seeing them, they’re just hands grappling with his flailing limbs, pressing down and inflicting new bruises.

Jet grits his teeth until his jaw aches more than the seizing muscles in his wrists as repetitive motion cramps his fingers. He hasn’t hated something this much since he heard his mother scream ( _that was a long time ago_ ) and saw the neighbor’s wife crumple down with her hair on fire ( _it doesn’t matter_ ). Finally the metal gives under his hands and he wrenches it away, flinging it at black, pointed boots.

Fire Nation soldiers sneer at his kids, pale faces charged with greed and sadistic glee. “Hey, Kid,” the one on the right taunts Jet. “Tell your friend to stay out of the market. We don’t serve thieving half-breeds here.”

“He wasn’t stealing anything!” Smellerbee yells. “We have money!”

The soldiers chortle, and one of them dares to step too close to the discarded chain. “As if your filth-tainted copper is worth anything!”

Jet is on his feet in an instant, whipping out his remaining hook sword, and now he knows what’s bothering him the most. The bastard on the right has Li’s swords. Snug in their sheaths, like the idiot hadn’t even loosened them in case of trouble. Never raised a flame to defend himself, just let himself be grabbed and tied down and near-killed because a handful of Torchers didn’t like seeing yellow eyes out of uniform.

“Jet!” Longshot’s hand clamps down on his arm, arresting his lunge before he can cut out the leader’s smug grin. “Wait.”

_Not here_ , he conveys in a single word. _We'll get them all later. Li needs us now._

“That’s right,” Pointy-Boot simpers when Jet snarls and sheathes his blade. “Better tend to your little thief. And get him out of here — before we throw the lot of you in a cell.”

“Jet, come on,” Smellerbee whispers. 

It’s not the prodding that breaks him out of his angry haze. It's the whimper from the shivering bundle half-scrunched into Longshot's lap. Scared. Disorientated. Hurt. Jet spins on his heel, dropping down and instantly shifting his stance so that he can gather up Li without pressing against raw skin. The kid still arches, shoving uncoordinatedly until Jet snaps at him and he flops back with a grumble. (He’s sixteen and tall enough to go eye to eye with Jet now, and he’s still the skinny shrimp they found in a rice paddy.)

“We’re going,” Jet says softly to his kids. “We’re not coming back.” Alone, without some blasting jelly and some pitch-laden arrows.

Smellerbee flanks him tightly on the right, Longshot on the left. Pipsqueak clears a path.

That night, Jet is quietly sick. He’s used to washing blood out of his uniform. He’s patched up Smellerbee and Longshot and even Pipsqueak enough to know more about their anatomy than is decent. He’s put Li back together more than the three of them combined.

It’s always harder with Li.

Jet can’t put a finger on it, but he suspects now, as he washes out his mouth and heads back to the camp, that it has to do with the resigned look in golden eyes earlier, when Jet promised they would take care of it, and they'd find him new swords in the next town (because they're not touching anything tainted by the Fire Nation), and Li nodded so seriously (with his neck in such a state that was taking impossibility to new levels) that Jet suspects the kid knows _exactly_ what they’re up to when he curls into his bedroll every night. 

He’s never said _anything_ , even to imply disagreement with how they handle the Fire Nation's oppression, and that's Li in a nutshell: all fluster and feathers and fire, wound around a soul welling up with honor and nobility that Jet can never understand, and never hope to become. Li is probably the only scrap of honor left in their camp, and Jet is going to keep him that way for as long as possible. He will drown the world in blood before he lets anyone take that goodness away from them. 


	5. Estrangement (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Li might be Earth now, but Jet knows the day is coming when they could lose their golden-eyed kid. He didn't expect the Avatar to steal him away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: Some description of injuries.

Sokka's first thought regarding the Freedom Fighters is, _'Get your frickin' hands off my sister.'_ Because Wheat-Eater smiles way too much and Katara is getting all gushy while Aang looks like somebody kicked Appa. (And Appa is being nonpartisan, which means that nobody listens when Sokka voices that something here is really off.)

Like the fact that the Freedom Fighters managed to slaughter an entire battalion of Firebenders with extreme prejudice (seriously, there was absolutely no reason to tie the captain behind his own komodo rhino), and now they have a Gold Eyes in their camp who looks like something chewed him up and didn’t like the burnt aftertaste. 

"What happened?" Katara's instinctive outburst is quite possibly the worst reaction, because everybody in the camp goes rigid. Jet looks like someone announced baby otter-penguin is on the menu, Longshot snaps the arrow he's working on, Smellerbee stomps off to hover by Golden Eyes, and the tiny kid who hadn’t accompanied the slaughter team just plants himself in front of the Firebender like he's going to personally maim anyone who comes near. Pipsqueak (who definitely needs a better alias) looms behind Sokka and he’s really starting to regret naming himself as the head of command.

“Fire Nation,” Jet says, and that kinda explains everything. It also gives Katara a free pass to coo over injured Golden Eyes, which absolutely contradicts the idea that Firebenders are the worst people to hang around right now. (Like, General Dragon launching fireballs at Appa kind of bad.)

“So... this is how you knew where the Fire Nation camp was?” Sokka guessed, because the Freedom Fighters are _nasty_ and what better way to infiltrate a highly secure camp than to interrogate one of the local guards?

Shrimpy kid catches on fast, while the others look like they’re deliberately pretending they _did not just hear that_. “You think we’d hurt Li? What kind of crazy, backwash town are you from?”

“But — But he’s a Firebender,” Sokka splutters. And now Katara has the nerve to glare at him! “Or Fire Nationy. Like the guys you just _killed._ ” With disturbingly methodical precision. 

“Li isn’t Fire Nation,” Jet says, picking at the hook of his sword like he has every intention of burying it somewhere warm and intestinal. Sokka instinctively wraps one arm around his abdomen. “He’s one of ours.”

“Yeah, and it was their soldiers who did that to him!” Smellerbee snaps. “Those Torchers don’t care who they hurt, just as long as they get a bit of fun out of it.”

“Their captain’s gonna get a looong look at the dirt before that komodo rhino stops running,” Pipsqueak says, cracking his knuckles with a slightly maniacal grin.

Li’s eyes narrow and he sits up on one elbow, yanking on Longshot’s sleeve. There are a lot of angry gestures and rasps like the guy would be yammering fit to shake the forest if the bruises on his neck weren’t impeding his vocal demonstration, followed by tight lip head-shakes from Longshot. Jet looks perplexed, but resigned to whatever argument he anticipates.

“Torchers had to die, Li,” Jet says calmly. “They weren’t going to stop with one demonstration.”

“They didn’t _have_ to die,” Aang contradicts softly. Golden eyes swing worshipfully towards him and Li punches Longshot in the arm. Aang only has eyes for Katara, however, and he looks down uncertainly when she scowls and crosses her arms.

“What else were the Freedom Fighters supposed to do, Aang?” Katara challenges. “The Fire Nation is destroying everything! Think how many more people would’ve been hurt when those soldiers returned.”

“That’s the attitude,” Jet praises, slinging an arm over her shoulder (and that is way out of bounds, hands **off**!). “We do what we can to keep the Earth Kingdom safe. That extends doubly to our own fighters. They’ll never hurt anyone again.”

Li goes back to scowly-face, only it’s scowly-face-in-a-pillow because it looks painful to keep his head upright for that long. Every exposed patch of skin is either purple or bandaged, and he’s shivering under the blankets that Longshot pulls back over his shoulders. There’s a certain edginess as Shrimpy takes back his position between Li and the rim of the platform.

“Duke, take a break,” Jet instructs the shrimpy kid, jabbing over his shoulder. “Pipsqueak found some blasting jelly. You two go with Sneers and put it somewhere useful.”

“And there’s jelly candy,” Pipsqueak says wilily, laughing when Li immediately smacks out a bandaged hand with a _gimme now_ glare.

“Not until the swelling goes down,” Jet says immediately.

Ooh, nasty one-handed gesture aimed for the snobgrass. At least one guy is standing up to him. (Not that he’s up to actually standing at the moment.)

“I can’t believe the Fire Nation would do this to one of their own,” Katara says, kneeling down like she’d help if she knew half a scroll about Waterbending healing.

Longshot snorts and shifts position, sitting crosslegged across from Li — between him and the edge again. (How’d they even get the guy up the ropes if he was this badly hurt? Sokka doesn’t want to know.)

“Not Fire Nation,” Longshot says precisely. “Ours.”

“The Fire Nation trashed him,” Smellerbee agrees. “He’s Li now, so stop upsetting him!”

“I didn’t mean anything by it,” Katara says, backpedaling quickly. “The Fire Nation is cruel and horrible. I’m sure Li isn’t anything like that.”

Jet makes a strangled sound, and there’s a smile before he ducks his head. “Li? If a turtleduck could spit venom, maybe." Sheathing his sword, he idles closer, _touching_ Katara on the shoulder again. "Katara, if you want to help, we need fresh water and bandages. Think you can give Smellerbee a hand?”

His brow creases thoughtfully and he mutters a curse. “What a time to lose our hot water heater. Smellerbee, you and Longshot get a fire going — and try not to burn down the fort. Li will be fine for a little while.”

Longshot gives a ‘ _don’t blame me when you’re wrong’_ shrug and follows Smellerbee further into the hideout. Jet settles himself crosslegged, pulling out a whetstone and a sharp poker. The hilt matches the hook sword at his waist, and now Sokka’s wondering what kind of force it would take to snap one of those things in half.

Li punches the cloak under his head and stretches out his arms, miming something equivalent to silent gibberish. There’s more grimacing than gesturing, and Jet scowls and yanks the grass out of his mouth.

“Stop straining yourself. You want to be stuck behind forever?”

More gestures. They seem more... distinctive, like a sailor’s curses in finger points. The previous sequence is repeated — a twist of both wrists, like the way Jet wields his hook sword. 

“No, I didn’t get your swords,” Jet snaps. “I told you, we’ll get new ones. I’m not touching anything fondled by those filthy bastards.”

Which really contradicts the jelly candy contraband...

Li thumps his chest and starts coughing, his face purpling under a ghastly wheeze, but the message is obvious. _Mine!_

“All right!” Jet exclaims, scrambling upright to simultaneously push Li down and rub the rippling muscles between his shoulders. “We’ll get your stupid swords! Stop trying to kill yourself and breathe already!”

Li has... a lot of obscene gestures in his vocabulary.

* * *

Jet doesn’t care much for the Airbender. It’s not that Aang is a bad kid, or that he can’t stop pouting over small victories (because it’s the _Fire Nation_ , and Jet's kids need to believe they’re making a difference), or that his bright clothing is asking for a few unfriendly arrows through the collar. It’s the way he seems to attract lemurs and giant bison and shell-less turtleducks. Li hasn’t stopped listening to the awkward pauses whenever the Avatar _doesn’t_ talk. (It’s every other sentence — Jet knows when troublemakers disagree with him, and this airhead is taking his disapproving silences way too far.)

There’s something disconcerting in the way Li looks... homesick, like there’s more freaks like him out there and one day he might just... fly away. (He won’t.) As if a few enchanting declarations from this childish savior could make him believe there’s more to fighting the war than night raids and ambushes (there isn’t), and one day the Avatar could lead the world to a united, bloodless victory. (It’s impossible, but Li’s a dreamer, and he’ll believe anything spun by a bad puppet show. Jet’s spent too much time investing in a sparkshooter to lose their most valuable asset.)

_Keep weaving your lies of pretty fireworks and lanterns,_ Jet mulls, gnawing the stalk of grass until it sours his tongue and the Airbender’s voice is pared down to bird chatter in his head. _There’s only one way to end this war, and that’s ending the firebrands._

Not Li, of course. Li is Earth now, with a convenient trick for heating water and blowing ammunition caravans without annihilating the guards. There isn’t any question those gold eyes will take them down roads otherwise barred. It might take a few more years, but Li is their ticket into the Fire Nation. 

Igniting the palace from within, with their own banished prince. The irony is too good for Aang to mess up.

“They’re leaving tonight,” Jet murmurs to Smellerbee.

She’s smart enough to keep still, but her small frame stiffens. “We can’t overfill the reservoir without them.”

“Don’t need to,” Jet says. “If the dam blasts now it’ll still wash out the valley. Water purges everything.”

He forgets that Li has a bit of a past, and paring our rumors in a crowded room is second nature to the kid. Golden eyes slide to half-mast, and the deck smokes lightly before the damage is concealed by a bandaged hand. 

Li starts _glaring_ at the Avatar, which is Jet’s cue that something stupid is about to go down.

* * *

“I just don’t think killing Firebenders is the answer,” Aang argues, cringing as he flops over yet another repeated appeal. He’s not good at speeches, and it doesn’t help that everyone’s looking incredulous or really, really bored. Even Katara covers a yawn. “Look, when I was a kid, my best friend was Kuzon — he was a Firebender, and he never picked a fight with anybody!”

“That was a hundred years ago, Aang,” Katara insists. “Things have changed.”

“No, they haven’t,” Aang says, waving towards the only Freedom Fighter who looks like he belongs on a volcanic island. “Li may be Earth now, but I'll bet he was born in the Fire Nation. If he can be good, why not give everyone else a chance? Are you really gonna declare war on....”

He’s about to appeal for the families, for the kids and the elders, for the servants and the farmers who want nothing to do with war, but Li moves his hand and looks down, and that’s the first time he’s dropped his eyes since Aang stood on the table. He can’t help but look, too.

There are characters burnt into the deck.

_Stay._

_Dam._

_Flood._

_Stop._

_Please._

Li meets his eyes, and gold hardens before the Firebender lays his arm back over the characters and the bandages around his wrist burst into flame. Jet flies into a controlled panic and there’s shouts of “Li!” and “What the heck?” from seven different throats before Katara is lunging with her waterskin, succeeding only in flicking Jet in the face and drenching Smellerbee. By the time Duke weasels in and yanks away the ashen crusts of bandages, Li is holding up his unburnt arm with an amused glint in his eyes, like the limb still doesn’t look like raw meat peppered with gravel. Aang would be sick over the platform if he wasn’t shocked stiff with revelation.

_Dam. Flood. Stop._ There’s a rock wall holding back the village’s water reservoir, and if someone takes that out there won’t be a Fire Nation encampment here. Nothing will survive.

Furtive glances from Li ground Aang in the present, and he gives a quick nod. The Firebender sighs and starts making faces at Jet’s choice of language while his arm is poked and prodded and bound in fresh linen. There’s an indiscernible scorch mark on the deck and ash in Aang’s lungs.

He’s gotta make Katara believe him.

* * *

"No!” Katara is wound up and emphatic and if the Freedom Fighters hadn’t slipped off sometime during the night this would be a really problematic conversation. “I can understand Sokka being jealous of Jet, but I thought we were in this together, Aang. Jet is doing everything he can to protect people from the Fire Nation!”

“I know Jet wants to free the Earth Kingdom, but he’s going about it the wrong way,” Aang says quietly. “He’s already killed Fire Nation soldiers. How do we know he isn’t going to use that blasting jelly to wipe out the village?”

“He wouldn’t,” Katara insists. “He wouldn’t kill innocents.”

“I say we check it out,” Sokka suggests mildly. “We find Jet doing nasty blowup business, we stop him. If he isn’t plotting anything devious, we’ll just be on our way. What could go wrong?”

Bad things always happen when people ask stupid questions.

There is a dam. And blasting jelly. And a terrifying moment when swords are held to Aang’s neck and Katara has to choose the Freedom Fighters or her brother, and before Sokka can scream for his sister and Jet can shove her towards the gushing cascade, there’s an arrow piercing Jet's forearm and an army of angry villagers and all Sokka can think is ‘ _Oh Tui, we left Appa with the sulky Firebender.’_

The town is gone, but the people survived. None of the soldiers made it out, which gives Sokka really a creepy sense of how Earthbenders treat their enemies. He’s all for calling a truce, but there’s pain in Jet’s eyes as he stomps towards Appa and demands for Li to get down.

Li tightens his mouth and shakes his head.

Smellerbee and Duke start pleading, and Longshot looks like his family just got washed out with the flood. There’s angry voices and accusations and Sokka realizes Li _can’t_ talk right now, not with the purpling welts on his neck, not with the quivering in his shoulders as he struggles to stay upright. Silence is the only argument he has, and he’s using it to make a point.

He won’t come down. Jet tries to climb up and drag him back. The villagers intervene.

“These kids won’t trouble anyone for a while,” a gruff-looking midwife says, gripping a squalling Duke like he’s due for a good sit in front of a blank wall. She shoves a sack of clinking jars into Sokka’s arms, and nods up at Aang as he helps Li lie down. 

“Comfrey for the bruises, nightshade, ginseng and valerian for the pain. It’s not for consumption.”

“Right, I knew that,” Sokka drawls, even as he forgets the midwife’s instructions because _pfft!_ Women’s work.

Jet is still hollering, yanking against the farmers gripping his arms, but a lean fighter’s frame can’t hold up against grown men who till acres from dusk till dawn. (There’s nothing left to harvest, now. The Freedom Fighters have a lot to answer for.)

Only Pipsqueak is surprisingly still, not offering a fight once he saw Li at the head of the revolution. His hands spasm like he’s trying to hold onto something he never knew was lost. Longshot manages to skirt the clamoring villagers and climb halfway up the saddle, like he has every intention of accompanying them to the North Pole, before he’s plucked down and shoved back into the throng.

When Sokka gets into the saddle, he has to turn around and face the front. Li is shaking, shoving away Katara’s consoling hand, wrapping both arms around his face. 

And Jet... Jet looks like he’s been stabbed in the gut.

It’s not a victory, even if none of the villagers died and the Freedom Fighters are locked in custody. Katara won’t look at anyone, huddled in her own world of self-condemnation, and Aang’s brightness is dimmed for one afternoon. He makes a pathetic attempt to draw Li into their circle, remarking about how great it would be to have a Firebending teacher, and Sokka’s the only one who hears the quivering, rasping whisper.

“Why can’t I ever be anything good?”


	6. Fragile (Fire Lily AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Boiling Rock is the worst place to imprison a Fire Lily. (Continuation of MuffinLance's "photosynthetic Zuko" concept)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An imagined continuation of MuffinLances' concept of "photosynthetic Zuko" from chapter 30 of "The One Where Zuko's Hair Matches Sokka's and Other Tales," where Zuko soaks in sunlight like a plant, and thereby has compassion on Appa and the prisoners of Ba Sing Se and virtually leads a revolution to free everyone, giving himself a one-way ticket with Uncle to join the Avatar gaang. (And is promptly conscripted as Aang's new Firebending teacher.)
> 
> The idea belongs to MuffinLance, Avatar belongs to the creators, and Neocolai stole everything. Muahaha.
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: None

“There’s another thing.” Sokka’s voice loses its cheerful edge, veering into a quiet panic that Hakoda hasn’t seen since Katara wandered off and her brother carried her home, dripping and freezing from her own Waterbending misfire. “You know Prince Zuko?”

“The son of the Fire Lord?” Hakoda is immediately on guard. “I don’t know him, but I know of him.”

A man can't know his enemy without looking him in the eyes, but Hakoda knows more _about_ Prince Zuko than he wants to let on to Sokka. A root of Sozin's line, steeped in the rage of his forefathers, obsessed with cutting down their last hope, ruthless in his onslaught against the Avatar: Prince Zuko may be young, but in three years his reputation has stretched to every port. He's burned villages, associated with pirates, attacked the Northern fortress, and demonstrated passable skill with the tsungi horn. (Hakoda does not need to know.)

If Sokka is implying that Katara is also here, and the prince of the Fire Nation has laid hands on her.... 

There is one grisly skill Hakoda’s picked up from the war, and that is how to break a Firebender’s neck without burning his hands. If he opts to show mercy to the enemy. 

There’s no mercy for a man who touches his daughter.

“Yeah, the thing is.... he’s on our side now.” Sokka switches from explaining to babbling in an instant, like he has to convince Hakoda before he’s shut down, and everything hinges on this one impossible concept. “I know he chased us around before, and he was really a jerk, but he freed Appa in Ba Sing Seh and now he’s Aang’s Firebending teacher and his cuddly, tea-loving uncle travels with us and he offered to help me find you here and I think I made the worst plan ever and it’s really bad. We have to get him out of here.”

Hakoda’s not sure whether he’s stuck on, ‘The Fire Lord’s son is training the Avatar,’ or ‘The Dragon of the West is cuddly.’ Both concepts range in the same insanity level as the Water Tribe’s most valuable source of intel coming from a surprisingly informed cabbage merchant, so he dismisses his consternation with disturbing ease. “Okay... what do we need to do?”

“Sunlight,” Sokka gushes. His hands are everywhere, flailing and gesturing in a manner Hakoda hasn’t seen since his son was six. “He’s what they call a Fire Lily, which is really weird but Aang says it’s normal, so he needs sunlight to survive, only I didn’t think it would be a problem since most of the prison is on a surface level and we were supposed to be out of here in two days max, and then I had to turn him in because a guard found us and it’s really bad now because they threw him in the cooler and they haven’t let him outside since — I think the warden knows what he is — and if I don’t come back with Zuko his uncle’s never going to forgive me.”

Once more Hakoda tries to ground himself (is he more concerned that Sokka is on familiar terms with the enemy, or that his son is worried Prince Iroh will hold a grudge, and is the old man an active threat?), but he keeps the skepticism out of his voice as he squeezes Sokka’s shoulder reassuringly.

“Okay, then. You got a plan?”

* * *

Hakoda’s seen starvation victims before, but he didn’t expect to find one in the upper ring of a Fire Nation prison. (From what little he’s seen of the Boiling Rock, they treat their own citizens well, even the traitors. Every thug and weedy purse-snatcher is well fed.)

Sokka doesn’t look surprised at all. “We gotta get him outside,” he pleads, one perfunctory glance-over enough for him to shoot a panicked look at his father. “I never should've let him volunteer!”

“I got this,” Hakoda reassured, nudging the boy (now a man, he’s lost so much time) aside and sliding his hands under the still, ghostly frame. There’s no visible injury or stench of infection, but the prince’s cheekbones are hollower than is healthy for an active teenager. The boy doesn’t even stir as he’s carried out of the cell. 

“They haven’t let him outside since you got here,” Sokka doesn't seem to realize he's repeating himself as he jogs ahead, leading Hakoda to the courtyard. “I got him out of the cooler as fast as I could but he was _freezing_ and I don’t think Fire Lilies can just spring back from something like that.”

Guilt settles back in Sokka’s shoulders as they step into the open yard, and he watches Zuko’s face like he expects him to spring to life from a few sunbeams. “I never should’ve suggested it. It was a bad idea anyways — they caught everyone who tried to escape. Zuko would never say no, though — not when he’s trying to prove to Katara that he’s on our side.”

Hakoda doesn’t think there’s much to prove, once Sokka has chosen an ally ( _friend_ ). He trusted his son to lead the village because the boy showed unusual discernment for his age. Anyone who can disprove Sokka’s instinctive skepticism is worthy of a second chance.

Besides, he has a feeling all of the stories they’ve heard about the Fire Nation prince were gleaned off docks and fish wives’ rumors. In the sunlight, it’s easier to notice that these aren't the manicured nails and arching fingers of a pampered prince accustomed to warring with pen and pride. There are callouses in the palms, scorch marks in the creases, nails bitten down to the quick. It’s hard to gauge without knowing how long the boy was in prison, but there’s muscle built into the thin frame and tension in the shoulders testifying of frequent combat. Hakoda would guess the Fire prince experienced more action than Sokka, and the years it would take for such indicators to develop is not something he wants to contemplate with his children now involved in the war.

The Fire Nation isn’t gentle with its soldiers.

“Hey!” 

Sokka skitters at the rough call, promptly stepping between a hulking prisoner and Hakoda (and thereby, Zuko. Hakoda isn’t blind). “Chit Sang... uh... prisoner transfer. Back to what you were doing!”

“Don’t get cheeky with me,” Chit Sang growls, looming over Sokka with a churlish expression. “I didn’t rat you out before, so spill it. You’re planning another escape.”

“Yes...? And no,” Sokka drawls queasily, blue eyes lilting to the side. (Oh, he’s definitely twisting this into the plan.) “Our Firebender’s out of commission and we need an extra man. You don’t happen to know someone who could start a riot, do you?”

“Hah! A riot? I can show you how that’s done.” Nonetheless Chit Sang shoves Sokka aside and gets himself a good look at Zuko. Hakoda shifts his stance, ready to kick the man in the gut. “What’d they do to the kid? I'm telling you, I didn’t squeal on him!”

“He’ll be fine,” Sokka says too hastily. “Help us out of here and I swear I’ll explain everything.”

“Huh. I’m holding you to that,” Chit Sang growls. He stomps past Hakoda, slaps another Firebender into the floor, and before the guards can intervene there’s controlled hysteria blasting the walls with flame.

“There’s Suki, Dad!” Sokka exclaims, dragging him through the mob. “Suki, over here!”

The little Kiyoshi warrior is less intrusive than Chit Sang, but her eyes lose a little light when she sees the Fire Nation prince. “What happened to him?”

“He’ll be fine — he’s already got a little color back,” Sokka reassures her, ducking as a bolt of flame erupts from one of the shouting prisoners. “I’ll tell you more later. We need to get to the warden.”

“I’ll take care of the warden,” Suki vows. There’s murder in that young face, and Hakoda is left to wonder how a ransacking, pyromaniac bounty-hunter has won over the sympathies of four kingdoms. 

“Alive, please!” Sokka calls after her. “We need a hostage!”

“All clear!” Chit Sang announces, gleefully flipping one of the guards over his shoulder. “Stairwell’s that way. Hope you Water guppies know how to climb.”

Hakoda has every intention of proving the dexterity of a Water Tribesman on a swaying ship mast, but there are ropes and then there are flights of steps, and neither are supposed to be scaled at full speed with a passenger in tow. They all look rather foolish when they reach the platform, only to find Suki with her knife already braced at the warden’s throat.

It should be easier from there, but it isn’t. Zuko starts grumbling and shoving at Hakoda’s chest whenever a shadow falls between him and the sunlight. The gondola tethers are blocked and the Fire Lord’s daughter pursues them with fire streaming from her boots. Chit Sang is a passable fighter, but from what Hakoda has heard about Azula, they’re drastically outmatched, and he’s got his arms full of unconscious Fire Lily. (That... isn’t the weirdest thought he’s entertained today, but it makes him wonder how the Fire Nation managed to dominate the hundred-year war when its princes are sun-fragile.)

Seconds before Azula can punch fire into the gondola’s hull, the rickety coach starts moving again. Alarm and disdain twists what might be a pretty face into something malevolent, for in the span of two minutes a handful of guards have turned against her.

“Hey, I recognize those two!” Sokka says, leaning out the window far enough that Chit Sang has to grab his collar. “They’re the ones who were guarding Suki — and they took Zuko to the warden. Maybe they’re on our side!”

“If they are, they’re dead,” Chit Sang says grimly. He pulls Sokka inside before he can see fire pulsing through the dock. 

They make it. Barely. Someone on the other side cuts the cords as soon as the gondola touches rock. Hakoda wishes he knew their names. Someone should honor their sacrifice.

There’s a war balloon that Chit Sang can barely keep aloft, a stomach-assaulting, pitching ride that leaves Hakoda longing for wooden planks under his feet and salt on his skin, and a yelp from Sokka when Zuko clubs him and rolls over, grumbling about clouds. 

It’s the strangest day of Hakoda’s life — and it’s only half as bizarre as the following encounter with the Dragon of the West, who fusses over his groggy nephew before welcoming them to a virtual rebellion of former Earth Kingdom prisoners, and brews a cup of cloudberry tea fit to serve to Tui. Hakoda finally has five minutes to settle in with his son on one side and his daughter on the other, while Sokka and the Avatar interchangeably chatter about Fire Nation flowers and prison breaks and how somehow Sozin’s Comet is going to make Prince Zuko the most powerful Firebender ever.

Hakoda... has his doubts. The Firebender in question is just coming inside as the sun sets, sunken-eyed and famished and grouchy, but strangely compliant when the little Earthbender squashes him from behind. He stuffs his face and grunts noncommittally when Aang goes into a detailed dramatization of the techniques Iroh showed him while his Firebending teacher was gone.

(The banished prince. Teaching the Avatar. Hakoda hopes that Sozin’s spirit is hearing this.)

The Avatar’s camp is nothing like the South Pole, with brittle grass beneath them instead of furs, a warm summer wind tugging the fire, and glowflies pulsing just beyond the treeline. Nonetheless, Hakoda has the feeling that if Kya was here, it would feel just like home.


	7. Gullible (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zuko is home, but dreams never last long.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: ANGST
> 
> Question of the Hour: Did anyone else notice that the Fire Nation Capital is built on top of a DORMANT volcano? Do they have Firebenders assigned 24/7 just to make sure that volcano stays dormant forever, or are we looking at the inevitable total demolition of everything Fire-Nationy? 
> 
> I think I need to go home and rethink my life.

It isn’t difficult to give the Gaipan villagers the slip. They don’t even have a proper prison any more. Neither is it ostentatious to ask around and find out which direction a fluffy, flying, field-decimating bison is headed. The tricky part, Jet realizes, is keeping all of his kids together.

Because Li was the sticky-sappy stupidhead keeping them grounded for the last five years, and he left them all behind. It raises all sorts of uncomfortable questions, and some of the younger kids start wondering if their mission is the right path. (They don’t get what sacrifice means. They never watched their parents burn.)

Some of the newer brats stray one morning, and they don’t come back. Smellerbee and Creeps hedge in closer, silently reassuring Jet that _they_ won’t run after a daydream. Pipsqueak and Duke are practically a duo now, so he knows that if he has the loyalty of at least one of those two, the other will stick around.

It’s Longshot who worries him.

The young archer’s limited vocabulary has narrowed down to monosyllables and head shakes. He watches the sky more than the earth, and Jet knows it’s only a matter of time before Longshot decides to hike off on his own. He beats him to it.

“We’re going,” Jet informs his much smaller crew, on a morning that’s hot and steamy and way too reminiscent of a broiling afternoon in a wilted rice paddy. “Ba Sing Se is the heart of the Earth Kingdom. We strike at the center and the Dai Li won’t stand a chance.”

Unspoken, he’s well aware that the Avatar needs to master four elements. When a job involves Earthbending, Ba Sing Se is the place to hang out. 

He can count on Smellerbee to stick with him. Longshot gives an innocuous shrug that sets Jet’s teeth on edge because that _isn’t how things work_ and he needs them to _listen_ to him and understand that this is for their own good.

Like he tried to make Li understand. Li with his stupid honor complex and ideals for how the world should coexist when nobody operates on that kind of moral high ground but it’s still ingrained into the part of Li’s soul that Jet can’t tweak and now he’s gone and he shattered everything he left behind and dang it, Jet’s not losing another kid!

He keeps a closer eye on Longshot, and Smellerbee chums up to the fidgety archer, trying to fill in the gap that a Firebender with sensitivities left behind.

It’s not fair. It’s not right or honorable or any of those weighty, impossible words that Li flings around like they have meaning when entire forests are burned to the ground. Li packed up his friendship and moved out, didn’t even give Jet a chance to convince him to stay, didn’t even warn them before it was goodbye.

Jet has a good mind to punch the kid’s lights out when he sees him again. And then he’ll hand him over to Longshot who will cuddle him like a spindle-legged spiderwasp and never let him pull a stupid ( _cruel_ ) stunt like that a second time. 

They just need to wait a little while. Plant themselves in the open, in a city where it’s easy to pass for refugees and where everyone in the Earth Kingdom has to drop by at least once a year.

Li will come.

* * *

Sokka has made a running list during the time spent Appa-traveling, while crossing ravines with crabby feuding tribes and helping the odd fisherman. It isn’t hard to narrow Li down. He’s quiet, grumpy in the evenings, moody the rest of the time, and really snuffly when he wakes up at night and finds himself alone by the fire pit.

“He just lost his family, Sokka,” Aang explains earnestly. “I think he’s gonna be sad for a few days.”

Oh right, like the Avatar can read a guy’s personality when the facts are staring them in the face. Sokka may not have four hundred plus reincarnations going for him, but he’s pretty sure he’s got Li pegged. Their new Firebender rescued an entire village during his first try riding a bison (with a few cracked ribs to boot), dissed a disturbingly sympathetic, homicidal maniac, and reportedly heated the elderly tribesmen's rations without setting Appa’s saddle on fire. He’s definitely a Grade-A melodramatic prince.

Sokka holds to his opinion right up until the ground starts rocking under his feet, and Li just curls up in a fur and goes **_out_**. No grumble-mumbles, no hand gestures while his throat finishes healing — just tightly wound limbs and shivers and rasping coughs that worry Katara out of her head and....

Huh. Shivers and teeth chatters. Sokka has enough self-awareness to realize he might be coming down with something himself.

And then Momo starts talking.

* * *

“We were flying in a storm, Aang. That can’t be good for a Firebender.” Katara’s worried about Sokka’s temperature, but she can hardly touch Li without feeling scalded and he’s gone from grimacing and rubbing at his eyes to shivering in a half-lidded trance in the space of hours. “I don’t know what to do for them.”

Rummaging through the midwife’s satchel doesn’t give Katara much hope. There are salves for burns and itching and swelling, but Li emptied them out for the travel guide's arms after the Zhangs and Gan Jins made it through the canyon.

_Sokka could take a few lessons from Li,_ Katara thinks to herself, curling up her nose as Sokka starts praising Momo's gargantuan ears. She squashes down the uncertainty that maybe the quarreling tribes reached an agreement because arguing one side or another would’ve caused too much strain on Li’s sore throat, and listening without comment on his part might have accomplished more than their splitting up and catering to each side of the story. Both the Gan Jin and the Zhangs got a good tongue-thrashing from their elders the moment Appa landed. Aang didn't even have to get involved. He still had the right idea, though. From what Katara heard from the Gan Jins, the Zhangs were just downright mean and....

There. She’s doing it again. Sighing, Katara sloshes a little water over the cloth strips she’d torn from Li’s sash (it was raggedy and torn, anyways) and drapes the makeshift compresses over the boys’ foreheads. _Maybe I’m just not good inside where it counts._

It’s a thought Katara hasn’t had to confront before, and she doesn’t like the sick feeling that accompanies it. Not everyone can be a pacifist like Aang! She’s already aware that she’ll never be as good as her mother. Sokka accepts her the way she is, and Li and Aang will just have to get used to it!

“It’s okay, Katara,” Aang says, misinterpreting the angry slosh of uncontrolled bending in the water skin. “Appa and I spotted a village coming in, and where there’re people there’s gotta be a healer. I can head down there now and be back before it gets dark.”

“It’s too risky,” Katara snaps, not because she can’t stop thinking about the canyon and later the fight she had with Aang and how Li rounded on _her_ when the Airbender ran outside the cave. (What right did he have to lecture her for shouting? They were doing just fine before he came along and started warming tea cups and cozying up to Appa and stealing Aang’s attention away from his Waterbending lessons!) “Gran Gran showed me how to ward off fevers before.” With white bark and herbs and hot tea, not the wet cloths she’s trying to use. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

“But Katara....” Aang shuffles nervously, his eyes flickering over her like he’s mapping out symptoms and she’s not sick, her throat is just a little dry. “You were coughing last night, too.”

“I’m fine!” Better than Li, at least, who looks so fragile when he’s sleeping, like one puff from a Firebender could blow him from Appa’s saddle. (And that’s another reason she can’t let Aang go down to the village. The Dragon General is out there somewhere, with his iron fleet and his walls of flame, and if Aang travels alone she just knows she’ll never see him again.)

“I’m not messing around, Katara.” Aang’s voice takes on a hard edge, the one Katara is starting to associate with, ‘Kuzon died and I’m not losing another Firebender friend.’ “Li’s getting worse and if you start hallucinating like Sokka there won’t be anyone to go for help. I’ll find a cure and be back before you can say Momo!”

“Nobody knows how to mimic sappy fireflies like Momo,” Sokka sing-song’s.

Cringing, Katara re-wets the cloth and wrings it over her brother’s head. “Maybe you’d better hurry.”

The moment Aang leaves, Li spurs into another thrashing fit. Katara holds him down, praying he won’t try running again because it took her and Aang to drag him inside the first time. “It’s okay. Just go to sleep!” she pleads. Vaatu take it, she doesn’t know what to do with Firebenders!

Falling back, Li nuzzles into the pillow, scrabbling to gather the blankets to his chest. Katara sighs in relief and pulls away, only to squeak when a hot hand grabs her own.

“Can I come home? M’sorry,” Li murmurs. “I’m your son, it’s me, Mom.”

Hot tears spark Katara’s eyes, and she knows the sickness is making her unstable. She tugs her hand free and tucks the blankets under Li’s chin, careful to avoid the greenish marks that are fading into yellow. There’s still a scratchy rasp to Li’s voice that makes him shut up every time he expresses an opinion, and sometimes Katara’s glad he loses confidence so quickly. (And sometimes she thinks Jet was right and Firebenders deserve to be scorched with their own blasting jelly.)

She doesn’t know how to think when Li gets involved, so it’s easier right now to blame her edginess on the sickness. When she’s stops feeling hot and cold and quivery she’ll be in her right mind, and she can give Li her honest opinion of what part he can play in the Avatar's future.

For now, all she wants to do is sleep.

* * *

Frozen frogs. Frozen frogs are supposed to cure his friends. What kind of crazy people live in this mountain village?

_Those who work with the Fire Nation_ , supplies the mental voice that sounds creepily like Jet. This time Aang doesn’t have an answering argument, because his hands are chained to a pole and the only reason he’s allowed to walk is because there’s a Firebender on either side of him and he’s been warned that he’ll be on crutches for six months the next time he tries Airbending.

General Iroh is terrifying. Like Li’s golden eyes got set in someone else’s face, only they’re angry and quiet and when he makes threats he means them. Aang keeps his feet to himself.

_I shouldn’t have left Katara. She’s sick, too, and now she has to look after the others without me!_

They bring him to an iron ship. Aang shivers at the feeling of bolts and doors and cramped passages where air can’t flow freely; where fire sucks the life away. _I can’t go down there. I can’t be stuck inside forever!_

He’s already squirming, bundling air around him like there won’t be enough if they lock him in the dark, and General Iroh raises his hand. _Oh no._

“You will not cause any further disturbances, Avatar,” the general states. He doesn’t even raise his voice and Aang can feel the iron doors slamming on his freedom. “You will be presented to Fire Lord Sozin and executed for your crimes.”

Crimes? What crimes? He didn’t ask to be born the Avatar! 

All protests fall short of Aang’s quivering lips and he can’t stop staring. Because this is the Fire Nation, this is what everyone is afraid of, and he can't understand how Li is so different from the rest of his people.

One grey eyebrow strikes for the sky, and Aang realizes in despair that he’s spoken aloud. The Dragon of the West doesn’t even ask him to explain himself. “Search the island. The Avatar does not travel alone; he must miss his friends.”

_I never should have left them._

* * *

They carry Sokka into the same cell, but not before bolting down Aang's wrists and ankles, so he can’t reach his friends. Katara beats her fists against the guard’s chest, her strikes uncoordinated and futile. She’s tossed into the far wall and she crumples into herself, mumbling for water. Sokka babbles about how it’s too dark to go ice dodging, but the fire lights are pretty. The soldier carrying Li hovers by the door. One of the guards pries open his eyes and nods. 

“That’s the halfbreed.”

“Freedom Fighters, huh?” the other guard huffs, turning away from the cell. “They’ve sabotaged their last outpost.”

“Hey, let him go!” Aang pleads angrily. “He’s not like the others! He didn’t do anything!”

“General Iroh will decide that,” the guard says darkly. The door slams behind the soldiers and they take the light with them.

* * *

“Aang, I’m sorry,” Katara mumbles, her voice a disassociated whimper in the dark. “I wasn’t really mad at Li. I didn’t mean to let them take him.”

“No one’s blaming you, Katara,” Aang says softly. “This is all my fault.”

He can’t tell how much time has passed, but it feels like hours. Sokka stopped muttering and fell into a shivering fit not long ago, and Katara’s cough is getting worse. Can Li even respond to an interrogation? How does the Fire Nation deal with traitors? Will they burn him alive? Throw him over the ship? Imprison him in the dark forever? (Aang doesn’t know what long stints without the sun would do to a Firebender, but Kuzon mentioned once that the deep forests in the Foggy Swamp must be harsh and there’s a reason the Fire Nation is built into the caldera.)

The door opens at last, but the guards don't bring Li with them. One of them steps forward with a key while the other sets a bucket of weirdly shaped ice in front of Katara. He wreathes his hand in flames and holds it to the Waterbender's throat, before nodding to his companion.

"One puff and the pond scum can join you in a ceramic urn," the guard with the key warns. 

Aang complies without a fuss. He rubs his wrists, jumping when a hand propels him forward. "What about Li? Where is he?"

"General Iroh will ask the questions," Flame-Hand says.

They shove him inside another iron-barricaded room. The air is too hot and dry, heat pulsing from a fire that lunges when the general raises his eyes from the flames. Aang is already feeling sticky and Iroh is wearing _layers_. How is that fair?

"Leave us," Iroh commands. His orders are obeyed with silent precision. Aang fights the urge to back up towards the door, and nearly hiccups when a brown frog squirms over the general's hands and plops onto the table. There's a forlorn ' _ribbit_ ' before the amphibian launches itself into a porcelain teacup, and Iroh's forehead wrinkles in the most creepily nonthreatening way _ever_.

Aang snatches the moment of distraction to look around the room. There aren't any torture implements on the table or chains hanging from the ceiling. There _is_ a pale arm poking out from underneath a really soft and extravagant looking blanket. 

"Li!" Aang crows, before he remembers he's standing before the Prince of the Fire Nation and how much these guys probably hate his friend right now. "What'd you do to him? He was already sick! He couldn't fight a penguin, let alone your soldiers!"

Fiery gold old eyes snap towards him, and the glare settles back into its permanent crease on Iroh's forehead. "You are unaware of the Firebender's identity?"

"His name is Li, and he's been hurt by the Fire Nation enough," Aang snaps. "If you want to pick on somebody, then start with me. I'm not afraid of you, old man."

That's probably the worst way to antagonize a general, and Aang's knees are subtly clocking together, but he grits his teeth and raises his head when Iroh straightens. Oh Hei Bei, it's all over, now the general's going to kill him and worse still he's brought death to Sokka and Katara and now Li, this whole maniacal journey has been for nothing....

"Avatar Aang," Iroh says crisply, his voice ringing against the iron walls, "You are ordered to leave this ship. If you or your companions are captured a second time, you will be shown no mercy."

Wait, what....?

"You will speak of this encounter to no one," Iroh continues, authority blazing in his eyes. "You will be escorted to the edge of the ship, and you will leave without any indication of your passage." Almost in deliberate afterthought he adds, "Take the Firebender with you."

"You're... you're letting us go?" Aang whispers. "But you hate us. You're Fire Nation."

"This offer will not be extended a second time," Iroh warns him.

Aang leaves. 

His bison whistle is missing, taken when he was first wrangled onto the ship, but Appa is somehow there in the water, waiting for him. It's just a short hop and a scuffle from the deck to the saddle. There's no trace of friendliness in dusky yellow and burnished orange eyes as the guards haul out Katara and Sokka (thank the Spirits, they're _walking_ on their own). When they bring Li on deck (still draped in a blanket, with his hair mussed and his eyes unfocused like it's all one continuous fever-dream), they're almost gentle as they pluck him up under the arms and plop him onto the saddle. There's a crate that wasn't there before, and blankets that look downier and less creepy than the Water Tribe's dead animal skins.

Aang doesn't get to ask why they're granted a courtesy escort out of the Fire Nation's clutches, or how any of the guards recognized a bison whistle, or who they think they'll fool by launching burning shrapnel into the sky like the Avatar is flying away instead of swimming just above the surface. None of this makes sense.

Except that Li looks a little more shell-shocked than usual, clutching a teacup and a pearl-handled knife like he's going to shake apart without them. Katara leans in to tuck the blanket firmly under his chin, her eyes wide and soft with concern. "Li, it's okay. The Fire Nation let us go. You're safe now."

Desperately the young Firebender shakes his head, a terrible smile dashed under tears before he wipes them away with his sleeve. "I ... I can't ever go home. I'm just Li now." Shuddering, he whispers, "Just Li."

* * *

_The Fire Nation is merciless._

_The Fire Nation burns everything it touches._

_The Fire Nation wants you dead._

Five years and Zuko never questioned Jet, because it's true. He dreams of the throne and his grandfather sitting upon it, shouting his displeasure before a hand grabs Zuko's hair and flames spurt towards his face.

In the good dreams, Jet pins the red-armored soldier to the earth and Zuko wakes up in a cold sweat. In the bad dreams, everyone burns and he's left alive, clawing at his shorn scalp and screaming for his friends to come out of the dark. 

Tonight he dreams about a fireplace in a room garnished in red, and hears a voice from the dreams he's not allowed to remember. Uncle looks so old, but his voice hasn't changed since he left for Ba Sing Se, and he's supposed to look taller but Zuko doesn't bother trying to figure out why the proportions are off and when his eleven-year-old hands got freakishly large. He flings himself at his uncle and buries his face in the smell of tea and smoke and stone, closing his eyes before Azula's sneer can take it all away again. 

Uncle just... stands there. There is a troubled sigh, before firm hands grip Zuko's shoulders and he is pushed away. That's... never happened before. Scathing gold eyes look down with reproof, and suddenly it's becoming the nightmare Zuko prayed he would never have.

"U-Uncle?"

Threat washes into disbelief and gruffness is softening into something akin to dread. Zuko doesn't want to push it (it's bad enough when Father raises his hand, he can't stand to see the same rage coming from his uncle), but he can't recoil, not when he's so close and everything is just like he remembered. There's a teapot and something floral filling the air and a frog on the table ( _wait, what?_ ) and silk under his fingers, and he knows he's going to wake up in the forest with a fly crawling on his nose but he wants this dream to last until dawn. He reaches out without thought, grasping the edge of his uncle's sleeve, making him stay. (Until he wakes up with a blanket clutched in both fists, because it always ends right about here.)

Calloused hands cup his face and he grabs onto them, closing his eyes as relief springs down to wet his cheeks. "Don't send me away again, please." He can't stand the roughness in his voice, it's not supposed to sound like this, not to Uncle, but none of it will matter if he can just say everything before the room vanishes. "I'm sorry I ran away. I won't leave again. I'll - I'll be loyal, and Father won't have to kill me. I promise, whatever I did I'll make it right. I want to come home!"

"Zuko?" 

He's crushed against a broad chest, and there's no comfy pudge that he remembers from before. It's like Uncle started behaving like a general and he's only hard edges and scold, but his arms engulf Zuko and he's not afraid.

"I thought you were dead," Uncle breathes. "When your grandfather gave the order...." His hands tighten in anger, but it's not directed at Zuko. (It's never a bad dream with Uncle. As long as Azula doesn't start singing and Father doesn't enter the room, it'll be a good dream. He's safe.) 

Uncle's voice turns strangely gruff. "Does the Fire Nation know you're here?"

"Huh? No, I'm not...." He's _Li._ He hasn't heard his own name in years. (But this is a dream, so Uncle would know that.) "Can I go home now? Doesn't... doesn't Mother want me?"

Tears are spilling from Uncle's eyes, and that's not right at all. It's Zuko's stupid weakness to cry, and Uncle's job to hold him and pour tea and wave before dawn shatters the vision. Then the bad taste in his mouth catches up (like slime and Valerian and pond scum accumulating on his taste buds) and Zuko grabs onto his uncle's arm, blinking hard and gasping when the firelight doesn't fade. "I'm not... I'm not dreaming?"

"No, Zuko," Uncle promises, like he always does. "Though I might wonder the same."

"Can I see Mother, then?" And Azula, because even if she teases him and pulls stupid jokes when Mai's around, he _misses_ her. "Am I going home?"

Uncle clutches him harder, but he doesn't cushion the words. "No, Zuko. Your grandfather gave written orders that the Fire Nation is bound to obey. If you are found you will be executed for your father's foolish pride."

"What?" Azula's taunt flares in his mind but he can't correlate the words with his uncle's voice. "What did I do? I don't understand!"

"Hush, Zuko. You'll sicken yourself." Gentle, firm hands prod him down until he capitulates, burying his face in a pillow that smells clean and faintly reminiscent of jasmine. "Your father made a terrible mistake, and the Fire Lord demanded that he pay the price with his firstborn. When I returned I believed you were lost forever. Now that I know otherwise, there will be... arrangements made at the palace."

The words sound ominous. Like treason. After years of hiding, Zuko knows better than to prod, but he isn't ready to lie down and listen, either. "Don't go," he pleads, bolting upright and grabbing Uncle's hand. _I know this is a dream, and I want it to last. "_ Stay. Please." _I don't have anyone else left. I left everyone else behind and now I'm not sure **why**._

A smile edged with sorrow eases the furrow in Uncle's brow, and he eases Zuko down and pulls soft coverlets up to his chin. "I will stay, Zuko. You must sleep off the rest of this fever."

That's the end of it then, proof that it's going to end any minute. Only it doesn't, because when he opens his eyes again Uncle is ushering him to stand, and suddenly there's a cup of flowery tea in his hand and a pearl-handled knife pressed into the other. He doesn't drink the tea. It's all he has to hold onto when Uncle pushes him away. 

_What did I do wrong? Don't you want me?_

They don't answer his questions, even when he begs. He's put on a raft that rumbles as it bobs in the water, and they leave him alone with the knife and a cup of cold tea. There's a girl poking at him ( _Katara_ , his weary mind supplies) and a blanket softer than goose down puddling around him.

_I can't ever go home._

_I can't stay here._

_I don't belong anywhere._


	8. Helpless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The shirshu poison is supposed to wear off after an hour. It doesn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: None

The paralysis is supposed to wear off after an hour. Zuko knows when it does because June slams an elbow into Uncle’s stomach and rolls off of him, stomping away to find her freakish, worthless shirshu. Zuko gathers himself to stand, because Uncle is being absolutely _useless_ right now and he’s _**fine** , _he can get up by himself!

He can’t.

Zuko takes a measured breath (he’s not panicking, his breathing is perfectly normal) and tries again, cringing when his hand won’t even _move_.

Uncle isn’t smiling anymore. “Prince Zuko, I fear the paralytic has affected you more than usual. We should get you back to the ship.”

“I’m not letting you carry me back!” Because that’s the last thing he needs, to be cradled in front of his crew like he’s a toddler who can’t walk back by himself. Zuko tries to throw a punch, fails, and feels a new wave of lightheadedness when there’s no flame to accompany his anger. “U-Uncle?”

“Perhaps you have a remedy for toxin,” Uncle says kindly to one of the nuns. “We will pay for your services, of course.”

“As if they deserve it for hiding the Avatar!” Zuko argues. He gets the look of, ‘ _You are not helping your cause, Zuko’_ and shuts up. Because shouting with his neck in an odd twist hurts, anyways.

Uncle has to carry him back to the ship. Zuko doesn’t look at the crew, doesn’t let on that he hears them, but there are _snickers_ and his face heats up and he can’t understand why Uncle couldn’t wait until nightfall when there would be fewer soldiers on deck.

“Can I be of any assistance?” Lieutenant Jee asks. He isn’t laughing — not openly, but he might as well be. Zuko doesn’t need his “help” and tells him just so.

“As you wish, Prince Zuko,” Jee says, the reluctant growl settling back into his tone. At least he can have the decency to act normal. This isn’t the first time Zuko’s returned injured, after all. (It’s just the first time he’s been tucked into bed like a child, without any blood or fever to prove he fought like a man.)

“Mother Superior assured me the paralysis will wear off by morning,” Uncle promises, fluffing the pillow obnoxiously and can he just _leave_ now? “We will continue our search when you are well again. Perhaps without the aid of pirates or bounty hunters.”

“Shut up, Uncle,” Zuko mumbles. He’s been arranged to face the door (so he knows if anyone tries to sneak in), and he’s never been so glad to see it close behind his uncle.

It’s a setback. A minor problem. He’ll be on his feet tomorrow, and he’ll train twice as hard — just to prove he won’t be kept down by a stupid shirshu tongue. He won’t ever be trapped like this again. Helpless. Immobile. Useless. He’s the prince of the Fire Nation, firstborn to the Fire Lord, and it’s time people started recognizing that. The next time he sees the Avatar, he won’t let him get away.

_I am worthy to be called your son, Father. I won’t fail you again._


	9. Invidious (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fire burns. Fire can also be taken away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: minor injuries, ANGST

Li drops out of his frozen-frog-induced cloud (or whatever creepy state of near-hysteria that was) the moment Sokka tries to imperceptibly ease the ridiculously delicate, hand-painted teacup from his hand. (Because those tea dredges have to be collecting mosquito larvae and Sokka needs a cup and there’s no way the Dragon of the West would serve tea to his prisoners so it’s probably poisoned. He’s doing Li a favor!)

The tea is immediately blasted into steam when fire belts just shy of Sokka’s hand. While Li looks mildly perplexed at his own flames, he scowls at Sokka (like it’s his fault the cup is scorched!) and stomps to the other side of the saddle.

Sokka grimly accepts that it’s time to re-evaluate their recent acquisition to Team Appa. Li isn’t a Grade-A melodramatic prince. He’s a pessimistic, cantankerous, firebreathing _dragon_.

Aang just has to take that opportunity to bring up Firebending.

“Is it true that breathing fire is the sign of a master?” Can the Airbender sound any more cheerful in the wake of Terrifying General handing them over to Appa? (Maybe he thought the bison would eat them? Sky bison do have cavernous jowls...)

Li’s eyes fly wide and he starts stammering, scraping frantically at the ash marks on his teacup. “What? No.” He clears his throat like this time it’s gonna fix the rasp, but of course it doesn’t. “I couldn’t get the basics down before I left... I mean... It was an accident.”

From past experience, Sokka figures that’s the extent of Li’s vocabulary for the rest of the morning. The guy’s too easily mortified to mince words.

“But I can show you... a few tricks,” Li blusters, hiding his face in a very thorough scrutiny of the cup. 

“Really?” Aang jumps on the opportunity while Sokka’s still twitching. One bound and the Airbender is plonked across from Li, while Sokka is left holding Appa’s reins. “Can you blast a fire punch? Form a phoenix? Shoot fireworks? Some of Kuzon’s friends could make their fire change colors.”

“I just... know a few katas,” Li mumbles, flaring as red as the blankets spread around the saddle. “Most of it’s accidental. Jet didn’t like it.”

“Well, Jet’s not here,” Katara says, her face pulling into that consternated, whimsical scowl she gets whenever the Freedom Fighter is mentioned. “I think it’d be good for you and Aang to practice.”

As if she hasn’t spent the last week slapping waves every time Aang touches the subject of Firebending. Not that Sokka blames her — he misses Mom, too. But these abrupt switches from potential assassin to supportive sister are making his head spin.

Li looks equally confused, but he clears a space in Appa’s saddle nonetheless. (Honestly, it’s not like talking about Firebending is going to make the blankets spontaneously combust. Although that would be tragic. They’re really, really soft blankets.)

“There isn’t actually a technique for Firebending,” Li explains. “I mean there is.... There **_is_** ," he emphasizes, like he's drawing back on fuzzy images of tiny Li running around learning how to play with fire. "I’m just not that good... I don’t know how to teach it.” He clears his throat awkwardly and holds out it hand, and — oh Tui and La there’s a fire on a highly combustible, fuzzy bison — but the flame just... flickers. Like it’s a handheld torch and Li’s inviting them over for scary ‘I met the Dragon General’ tea.

“You have to feel it... inside,” Li says, stumbling over the words. “It’s like a piece of your soul, you just... let it out.”

“Huh. Like this?” Aang holds out his hand and there’s a puff of something; it could be smoke or just a belch of hot air. The Airbender wilts.

“Um. I think that’s how you start?” Li encourages.

At least he’s no longer staring mournfully at the dead bugs floating in his tea.

* * *

“How unfortunate that you lost the Avatar.” Zhao is no fool. He knows that General Iroh is ruthless; cruel even, in his diabolical traps. This is a man who bides his time until the snare springs, after which it was too late to escape five moves ago. (The general used to play Pai Sho. Zhao can’t help but correlate the two.)

“Perhaps your sources are withholding crucial information from you,” Iroh states. He’s as unmovable as the wall he failed to overwhelm. “The Avatar travels with a Waterbender. We were caught off guard on a full moon. The Fire Lord will not be so lenient if one of his admirals fails to account for this new development.”

Infuriating old man! Zhao relishes the moment he presents the Avatar to Fire Lord Azulon, thwarting the general and proving that royal blood cannot match military might. There’s only one sweeter vengeance, but the boy hasn’t been sighted in years and the scouts Zhao sent after him never returned.

(He’s alive. Somewhere in the four kingdoms there’s one final link to break an old man’s spirit. Zhao will have his recompense.)

In the meantime, he’s gathered enough about Avatar folklore to plan his next move. Air, Water, Earth, Fire. The Avatar already left the South Pole, and he still hasn’t mastered Waterbending.

It’s time to head north.

* * *

“Jet.” 

He doesn’t want to hear it, but putting Smellerbee off won’t make his kids reappear. “When.”

“Last night.” Smellerbee is taut and angry, arms folded across her stomach like she might fall apart. “There’s a merchant putting out posters for stolen Dao swords.”

Gritting his teeth, Jet forces himself to let it out in a harsh breath, rather than a scream. “Any idea where he’s heading?”

“The Avatar went North,” Smellerbee says. “I’ll tell Sneers to pack up.”

“No.” Jet is trembling with rage and he’s going to _kill_ Li when he sees him again. “We can’t afford a wild goose chase. Sooner or later they have to come to Ba Sing Se."

“But it’s Longshot....” For the first time Smellerbee questions him. What has that cursed Firebender done to his kids? “Jet, we don’t abandon family —“

“He abandoned us!” Jet shouts, throwing down the half-dry greenware that used to be a wobbly crock. “We gave him a family and a home, and he threw away everything for a stupid legend!”

Smellerbee steps back in surprise, but she’s hardly scared off by flying tempers. (Li used to lap fire when he was properly annoyed.) “I’m not talking about _Li_ , Jet.”

Deflated (they’re all leaving him, he can’t... he’s given them _everything_ ), Jet sits down and gathers up dusty, broken pieces of clay. He _hates_ pottery. Too much mindless work leaving his brain with nothing to do except to think and mull and despise people for leaving him behind.

“Longshot made his choice,” Jet says between gritted teeth. “If he wants to scamper after Li, let him.”

He's done with goodbyes.

* * *

Bato is not impressed with their recent acquirement of a Firebending teacher. Aang doesn’t blame him, much — those burn scars look like they hurt. A few sessions of watching Li form a flame in Aang’s hands, cupping it so the wind won’t extinguish it instantly, finally eases his suspicions enough that he isn’t reaching for a boomerang every time Li sneezes the fire into an ember hailstorm.

“Sorry,” Li mumbles, wiping his nose and grimacing as he flicks glimmering bits of charcoal off his sleeve.

“Is this why they’re seeing so many forest fires in the Earth Kingdom?” Bato asks softly, because this is clearly a kid with hay fever and he doesn’t know what would happen if one of the Scorchers caught a cold.

Aang knows when Bato’s set aside his misgivings for good, because he gives Li a mark for helping Sokka with his ice-dodging rights. It’s supposed to mean something like loyal or steadfast, Aang thinks, because they’ve all been given something positive to live up to (which Aang has already failed), but Bato harrumphs softly and says, “Pertinacity,” which sounds more like stubbornness and that doesn’t go far in making Li part of the team.

There isn’t much point in arguing, because Aang has already messed everything up in his desperate attempt to keep his friends close. When Katara sees her father’s map and marches away with Sokka, Aang expects Li to follow them.

“You don’t have to stay,” he whispers, stroking Appa’s nose. “I know you won’t be able to trust me now.”

“You’re not... I don’t.... I can’t....” Li folds his arms and spins around, breathing between his teeth like he’s trying not to lose his sanity. “Where would I _go?_ ”

And then Aang gets it. Katara and Sokka have their dad. The Southern Water will welcome them back as heroes. Li ran away from his friends, and was cast away from the Fire Nation ship and anything resembling his own people.

He might not be the last Firebender, but he doesn’t have a home. Just like Aang.

“I guess we’re going to the North Pole, then,” Aang says, feeling lighter and safer than he has in a long time.

(Because now he knows that Li won’t leave once he gets tired of staring at clouds and teaching Aang basic Firebending stuff that he just can't understand. He’s like family... at least, he’s Aang’s family now.)

Besides, Li has a habit of bringing people together, much like a mother turtleduck gathering in her brood. Before Li can finish rolling the blankets and arranging the “saddle nest” to his liking, Katara and Sokka are running down the path, and Katara has an arranged ( _beautiful_ ) speech about how she was wrong and how they ought to stick together. ( _She’s always welcome._ )

Li is the one to break Aang out of his floating, breathless haze, and his offhand comment is quite enough to set Sokka off.

“Fine. You can come.”

“Like we needed your permission?” Sokka yells. Because that’s what brothers do, and Aang’s gonna call his friends his family until the war is over and he doesn’t have any sensible reason to ask them to stay.

It’s a wonderful feeling.

It lasts until they meet Master Jeong Jeong and Aang wants to puff Li out of his perfectly poised, panache posture. At least Li was trying to show him how fire works — all Jeong Jeong lets him do is stand there. For hours. In a muscle-cramping, frog-legged position that makes him feel more tense by the second, while Li keeps breathing in and out like he’s been doing this his whole life and he could stay at it for the next hundred years.

“I’m gonna go check with Master Jeong Jeong,” Aang says breezily, zipping away before Li can say something about old hermits having great wisdom. Li… just breathes.

“Firebending is boring,” Aang mutters to himself, kicking a rock down the mountain craig. “I already know the rules. Feel the fire, let it out. When am I going to practice with some real flames?”

He figures out pretty quickly that Li isn’t just a bad Firebender; he was being stingy. All Master Jeong Jeong has to do is hand Aang a scorched leaf and he’s got his own fireball in his hands. 

“Not so bad, huh, Li?” Aang laughs, tweaking just enough air to spin the fire into a pulsing globe. 

Li observes him for a moment and then lunges into a stance, spreading his hands to encompass a similar ball of flame. “That’s a good trick.”

A _good trick?_ Aang managed a new bending technique on his first try and all Li can do is compare him to a cheap circus performer? “How about this?” Aang exclaims, thrusting the heel of his hand upwards. A dazzling arch of fire pierces the sky and he laughs, trying it again. 

“Aang!” Katara’s voice seems so far away. “Don’t overdo it!”

“I’m perfectly in control!” Aang shouts back at her. “Hey Li, watch this!” Spinning into a crouch, he weaves the air around him, fluming hot air like an orange spin-top. Now if that isn’t enough to impress the stuck-up, perfect little —

Fire blooms back in his face, scorching his eyes and nose, and for a moment he sees the outline of a cruel man crowned in gold. He hears Li yowl and a scream is torn from his own throat before he falls back into the water, pushing deeper into the cold flow, curling around the pain.

_ Is this what it’s like to burn to death….? _

* * *

“Aang!” 

Katara screams and covers her face, choking as her next breath is smothered before she can inhale. Choking, she drops to her knees, where the air is still sweet and she can check to be sure her eyebrows didn’t burn away. 

“What was that?” Sokka shouts. She hears him running, fishing pole discarded, before his strong, safe hands tuck underneath her arms. “Katara, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” she whispers, staring aghast at her hands. They’re just lightly singed, but every hair has been incinerated and she can’t bear to imagine what would’ve happened if the fire had come a little closer.

“Aang’s down!” Sokka realizes, frantically scanning the lake. 

“Where’s Li?” Katara echoes. A brief glance and both siblings run for the water, splitting apart as water sloshes near and deep. Sokka is faster — he outpaces Katara and goes for the deep end, grabbing for the pale hand that claws at the surface. Katara simply  _ moves _ the water and grabs Aang by the collar, hauling him onto dry land. 

“Aang, look at me! What happened?” The Airbender’s face is already deep red and his eyelids are swollen shut. His orange hood falls away in tatters, sticking in places to the burned skin on his shoulders and forearms. 

“I’ll tell you what happened!” Sokka hollers, dragging Li none too gently onto the shore. “I saw the whole thing! Aang was minding his own business and Li just smacked him! With fire! What is your  _ problem _ , Firebender?”

Yanking his arm away, Li coils around the limb, breathing harshly between his teeth. His charred sleeve flicks away in the wind, revealing red stripes that darken the closer they extend to his elbow. Katara can’t see anything past that, but she gulps in dread. _He has to be in agony..._

“I think we learned a valuable lesson today,” Sokka lectures, panic tearing through his voice. “Fire bad! Crazy Mouth-Grass was right — there’s nothing funny about playing with fire!”

“Shut up, shut up,  _ shut up!” _ Li howls, digging his forehead into his knees. He’s not even breathing right now, just hiccuping in quick spurts, and Katara can only be grateful that Aang is unconscious.

“Sokka, we have to get them into the water!” Water cools. Maybe it’ll keep them calm until they can get help.

“But we just went to all that trouble to  _ save  _ them from drowning!” Sokka splutters.

“Just do it!” Katara grabs Aang under the arms and hauls, before snorting and just bringing the waves up to carry the two injured boys into the lake. Li is easy — all she has to do is submerge him on one side and he stops writhing. How is she supposed to help Aang without immersing him completely?

_ Don’t wake up, don’t wake up, just relax, _ Katara pleads, scooping water gently over Aang’s face.  _ Tui and La, what are we going to do? You have to be okay! _

As if her very being echoes her words, she feels a tug on her chi and suddenly her hands feel cool, gliding through the water like she’s sifting cold clay. The red scald recedes and peeling skin strips away, revealing new, unblemished flesh. Gasping, Katara nearly drops Aang again, and smiles in hysterical relief when blue eyes crack open.

“Katara….?”

“How’d you do that?” Sokka wonders, dropping Li and sloshing over to get a closer look. 

“I… just knew how?” Relief makes Katara feel lightheaded, but she reminds herself that two boys were injured, and one of them is still sputtering and trying to drag himself onto a rock. Li gives her a haggard look as she approaches, like he’s expecting to get dunked  _ again _ , and he cringes when she raises the cold water to his arm. Immediately upon contact he blanches… stills… sags as the pain recedes. There’s a cornered look in his eyes as he backs away, like he’s waiting for her to round on him next.

Well, he isn't wrong. 

“What happened?” Katara demands.

“Actually, I was kinda wondering the same thing,” Aang comments, rubbing at his eyes. (Katara doesn’t fail to notice, his eyebrows and lashes haven’t reappeared.) “I think my fire got out of hand.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.  _ Li _ attacked you,” Sokka accuses. 

The Firebender flops back resignedly. There’s weary grimness in golden eyes as he implores, “Can I at least get out of the water before you interrogate me?”

For being the skittish Freedom Fighter with collar bruises around his neck, he’s certainly improved in voicing his opinions, Katara acknowledges reluctantly. “Fine. But if we don’t like your explanation, you can stay here with Master Jeong Jeong. Permanently.”

* * *

Why does everyone try to bump him off on the nearest conceivable ally? (Only the Freedom Fighters kept dragging him back. Vaatu, what was he thinking when he ran off on his own?) Zuko cradles his aching head, his arms convulsing from the explosive flame that lashed out before he could think.

It doesn’t matter how he explains it. The nightmares, the ghost-hand yanking on his scalp, the fire that would’ve branded his face if Jet hadn’t intervened. He panicked. Fought back.

They’ll never believe him. 

“I didn’t mean to.” Sokka snorts and Zuko knows he’s building his own pyre. “I’m  _ sorry, _ I thought — I didn’t realize it was — I was scare— I thought it was a Firebender and I reacted. I’m sorry, okay? I wasn’t trying to hurt Aang!”

“Well, you did a great job of showing it!” Sokka snaps. “Who needs Sozin’s comet when we have a nice Firebender right here to do the job? Hey, Fire Nation! Come pick up the Avatar, he’s well cooked and ready for you!”

“All right, I get it!” Zuko shouts, leaping up in a flurry of loose sand. “I can’t control myself! I’m a rubbish Firebender and I can’t even get the basics right and I nearly killed Aang! You don’t have to tell me, I’m — I’m —”  _ I’m going, I won’t beg you to let me stay, it didn’t work with Uncle and it certainly won’t convince anyone else, but maybe if I go back and prove I’m sorry Jet will let me come home but it isn’t home, Mother isn’t there but I  _ **_can’t_ ** _ go back, I’ll never see her again and maybe they don’t even miss me, maybe Azula is a better replacement she was always better…. _

“Li, stop it.” Aang's voice is quick and authoritative and Zuko  _ has _ to sit down because if he doesn’t he’ll fall over and then it’ll be a real drama show. “Just calm down, okay? Breathe like Master Jeong Jeong showed us.”

In through the nose, out through the mouth. Rapid puffs turn into careful breaths, and by the time Aang starts talking again the black spots are receding and Zuko can see the sand squelching between his toes.

“I get it, okay?" Aang says gently. "It was an accident. We were both moving too fast and we hurt each other. Master Jeong Jeong was right: fire is dangerous.”

But it isn’t. It’s warmth in his soul, protection from the white masks, light and safety and sparkling rivulets in the night, until it’s wielded by someone else and then it  _ burns. _ Zuko shakes his head.

“I think we should stop practicing Firebending,” Aang declares. “If this happens again we could hurt Sokka or Katara, or even Appa. It was stupid for us to practice hundreds of miles up in the air!”

“Finally someone agrees with me,” Sokka crows.

“I mean it, Sokka!” Aang snaps. “I finally get it. Fire without control only destroys. Until Li and I can control ourselves, Firebending is _out_.”

“He’s been practicing when we’re sleeping,” Sokka tattles.

“What? No, it’s not —” He isn’t doing anything wrong, it’s a flame cupped in his hand while he’s  _ meditating, _ and he only does it at sunrise, and he can't _not_ do it because if there’s one thing he remembers from Uncle it's that bad Firebenders don’t meditate and that’s how people get hurt.

No one listens.

“Aang made a good point, Li,” Katara steps in, and suddenly there’s three voices hemming Zuko in on every side. “If I hadn’t used Waterbending to heal him, we could’ve lost the Avatar! We can’t take chances like that again!”

“No Firebending,” Sokka declares.

“Not until we learn better control,” Aang pitches in.

“It’s for everyone’s safety,” Katara concludes.

One round of bad bending and Zuko is left without a single argument (not one they’d believe if they gave him half a chance). As the others walk away he’s tempted to flop down and draw his knees up to his chest, tell them to go take on the Fire Nation by themselves,  _ he’s _ going to stay right here and train until he gets it right. 

He stands up and follows a little ways behind.

Even if Master Jeong Jeong agreed to train him, he would be one Firebender isolated in the Earth Kingdom. No dao swords, no contacts, no way back to Gaipan. He hasn’t been on his own for five years, and he doesn’t want to run again. (Blood beading on his cracked lips, blisters on his feet, the thud of pursuit ringing in his head as he waits for the rats and crows to feast on his emaciated body.) He doesn’t want to die alone.

  
Besides, Jet  _ hated _ Firebending. It should be easy enough to slip into Li’s shadow again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to end happier, like Aang isn't afraid of Firebending because Li makes mistakes too, but then Zuko's bad luck caught up. He really can't ever be good. :(


	10. Jäger (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zhao catches up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Freedom Fighter!Zuko is dominating my brain and I realize I would've been better off making a separate fic just for this PLOT that's evolving.
> 
> Ah, well. Have another chapter.
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: Violence, minor injury, Zhao
> 
> (For the record, Zhao is still creepy, but there’s no threats of anything NC-17 in this story. In fact, he'll be sure to send Uncle Iroh a lovely note and an urn of very special ashes when he gets the chance. Such a courteous admiral, to reunite the old dragon with his beloved nephew.)

When Aang first discovered he was the Avatar, Firebending automatically came to mind. Kuzon made it look so easy! A flame in the hand, a spark over the shoulder, a rippling arch; some of the entertainers soaked brightly colored paper in different solutions, and when they twirled across the stage the paper curled into rainbow-hued flames. 

Li breathed fire like it was part of him. He said he wasn’t any good but untrained Firebenders couldn’t just pluck a flame out of midair and hold it steady for hours, like Li did that one night when they wandered too far away from Appa and had to find their way back in the dark. (No thanks to General Dragon, for stealing his bison whistle!) For being someone who seemed uncomfortable using his own element, Li knows a lot of tricks.

_We still hurt each other,_ Aang acknowledges, hanging his head. _Fire is too dangerous when there’s no control._

Fire is dangerous, period. One look at the smokey ring around Katara’s face and Aang knew he would never try Firebending again. Fire hurt his family.  It’s not worth the price of being the Avatar.

When Katara screams and smoke billows over the trees, Aang starts running. Because now he knows that Li isn't able to control himself, and Katara and Sokka are with him alone.

Maybe the Fire Nation isn’t capable of being good.

* * *

How quaint to see his old teacher again — the pathetic old man. Prince Iroh may be a dawdler and a riddler, but he has enough respect for the Fire Nation to act like a general. However, if the Avatar has brought treason to his list of faults, it’s only a matter of time before Azulon’s line is relieved of one more heir. The royal family has been a laughing stock for two generations. It’s time for new blood.

Zhao’s target is the Avatar. He finds his companions instead, and proof that Prince Iroh is an Air Nomad sympathizer. The fabled “Waterbending Master” is nothing more than a clumsy girl who loses control the moment fire raises the hem of her skirt two inches. 

“Now, I’ll ask one more time,” Zhao says, raising the flames behind the girl until the sap-laden trees swell and explode, splattering her with sticky embers that melt fur and skin. “Where is the Avatar?”

_“Sokka!”_ the girl shrieks, scrubbing frantically at her dark skin.

How noble. It must be the clumsy boy with the wolftail coming to her rescue. Perhaps they are family — or betrothed. (The Water Savages have no qualms about sparing their youth until wisdom has ripened the mind.)  Zhao tracks the pelt of feet and spins at the last moment, catching the boy by the throat. He startles, sweeping in a glance the Earth style garments, fighter’s limbs, and gold eyes set in a pale visage. There was no fourth companion on Roku’s island.

“Well, what have we here?” A colony boy, perhaps; sired by criminals or drenched in mixed blood. An ideal tagalong for a boy traveling with Pond Scum. “Do you also swear loyalty to the Avatar?”

“Li!” Water flicks the back of Zhao’s skull, nearly rocking him off his feet. He can hear the girl gathering another shot as she yells, “Don’t just hang there! Use your bending!”

There’s more irritation in the boy’s eyes than fear as he adjusts his grip on Zhao’s wrist. Interesting. It’s almost like the boy sprang out of a painting, angles sharpened and luster lost after too many years away from the caldera’s natural fire. Almost as if....

“It can't be,” Zhao breathes. Delight wells into a deep laugh, for there's no questioning the boy’s origins. His father’s sharpness contrasts the weakness of his mother’s eyes. Zhao came to this island for a prize, and he’ll walk away with the lost prince. It’s too good to be true. “So the old man knew you were alive all along.”

Naturally the boy proves himself the same nuisance he was in his youth; the moment the Waterbender throws Zhao off his feet from behind, fire engulfs his wrists.

“Gahh!” He falls but he takes the boy with him. He won’t lose this chance now. Scrabbling limbs turn into frantic, uncoordinated blows and he easily pins the boy’s arms beneath his knees. One hand engulfs the prince’s jaw and he pinches the boy’s nostrils shut. Water punches his shoulder, nearly dislodging him. Growling, Zhao sends a retaliating volley with his free hand and the Waterbender doesn’t get up to try again.

Weakened kicks scatter sand as golden eyes glaze. It’s a pity; Zhao would have preferred to take his time, but the Avatar is slippery and if he can’t accomplish one mission, at least he can present Fire Lord Azulon with the bloated corpse of his grandchild.

Besides, compassion has a way of drawing out the balance-keepers.

“Let him go!” 

Zhao glances up and one side of his mouth curls in a smile. So he can have retribution and victory in one sweep. “I might have known the Avatar would collect the backwash of the Fire Nation’s mistakes.”

The Avatar seems to think he casts an imposing figure, but his stance is weak and his bending is a child's defense. He’s running out of friends to save him.

It doesn’t mean he won’t make a nuisance of himself.

“I said, _let him **go!** ”_

Wind like a volcanic blast slams into Zhao and the beach spins into a whirlwind of water and sand and sky. He falls against a tree, spitting out grit, and bellows as the child helps the banished prince stand. 

“Li, get Katara to Appa!” the Avatar orders, stepping in front of the wheezing prince as if he can protect the fool. “I’ll catch up.”

“Air can’t stop fire. You need help," Zuko rasps, lowering himself into a sloppy stance. (What an embarrassment to a noble line.)

“Are we really arguing about this?” the Avatar scolds, slapping the prince's hand down. “Katara’s hurt! Get her to Sokka and come back for me. Trust me, I’ve got a plan.”

“Yes, run away, your highness,” Zhao mocks. “It seems to be your preferred resort; why stop now?”

The boy goes ashen, stumbling back a step. Did he really think that no one _knew?_

“Stop making fun of my friend!” the Avatar shouts, slapping his hands together. 

Once more Zhao is thrown off balance, but he keeps his footing this time, retaliating with a sharp crack that evaporates two inches of the shoreline. In the corner of his eye he can see the worthless mongrel gather up the Waterbender and take off at a full sprint. The coward. A man who can produce such offspring isn’t fit for the throne.

Granted, Azulon’s legacy won’t last for long if he persists in executing his grandchildren.

Smirking, Zhao focuses on incinerating the Avatar. The pond scum and their tagalong won’t leave the mainland without their last hope. He’ll find them.

* * *

“What did you do to her?”

“It wasn’t me!” The retort is more of a squeak than a squall, because there are _fingers_ constructing his _breathing_. Why do people always aim for his throat?

“Oh, so on a beach with only two Firebenders, the apathetic geezer was the one who smoked my sister?” Sokka yells.

“Get _off_ of me!” 

Sokka has the sense of mind to release him the moment his hands warm up, and Zuko tries not to think about gravel in his eyes and the ground rushing beneath him as massive claws gouged into the dirt, pounding strides reverberating through his entire body. Rolling clumsily to his knees, he scrubs his neck vigorously as if he can remove the feeling of two different sets of hands. 

“Is this going to be a pattern?” Sokka berates. “Because I’m starting to think it was the worst idea, bringing you along. Bad, bad Firebender!”

“Would you just shut up!” Stomping past the irate teenager, Zuko grabs for Appa’s horn, hauling himself onto the behemoth’s head. “There’s a fleet of Firebender ships by Master Jeong Jeong’s hideout. Aang’s holding them off.”

“A f-fleet?” Sokka has the good grace to look repentant. “So it wasn’t actually —“

That. Doesn’t deserve finishing.

“Oh. Oh,” Sokka says, squirming a little before he blusters, “Well, at least we have a master Firebender on the island.”

“He won’t be any help,” Zuko states, resentment lacing his voice. “Aang needs a back door. Hurry up! I think Katara has the equivalent of heat stroke but we need to get her to a safer body of water so she can heal herself.”

“Hey, no arguments here!” Sokka says, scrambling up without a fuss. He wavers, unable to balance himself and his sister, and Zuko reaches out instinctively. He ought to let the idiot land on his head (there's probably no intelligence to be lost), but Katara can’t catch herself and she was already crying....

( _Hot skin and tucked limbs, smoke rank in his next breath, soft sobs hidden in his vest as he jostled her, he couldn’t stop but it was **hurting** her, and Aang was fighting on his own but Zuko had to **choose** and she was so small, like a lop-eared rabbit speared by a hawk and the admiral would only use her to get to Aang...._)

“I’ve got her,” he promises, pulling the Waterbender up and holding her until Sokka can arrange the saddle blankets and take her back. (She’s as small as Zuko imagines Azula would be. If she was here. If she’s okay — Uncle never said if she was alive.) ( _She is._ )

As soon as Sokka nods, Zuko turns around and nervously wets his lips. He’s never done this before.

“Appa, yip-yip!”

* * *

Wasted! Three ships burned: an entire day’s delay, and he has neither prince nor Avatar to show for it. Zhao shoves the white-faced commander aside before he can finish his prattle.

“Send word to the fleet. We’ll trap the Avatar before he can master his second element.”

“B-But Admiral, they’ve turned —“

“Do it!”

The imbecile obeys. Shaking fire from his fists, Zhao looks back at the black cloud spreading over the mainland and smirks. A small price for the villagers to pay for concealing the Avatar. They will regret their duplicity when the harvest burns.

“Lieutenant Teruo,” he says, snapping the soldier to attention. “There is a traitor accompanying the Avatar. I want a bounty on him so high that his own relatives will be tempted to collect.”

“Yessir,” the crewman stammers. “The name, Sir?”

“He calls himself Li,” Zhao answers. “Gold eyes, perhaps fifteen summers.” Take away a year lest someone starts  _ questioning _ . “He’s a runaway from the colonies. Refer Liu Hong to Commander Longwei for a description.”

“Yessir. Right away, Sir.”

“Oh, and Lieutenant,” Zhao says casually. “Double the bounty if he’s captured alive.”

If Iroh wants to spare the boy pain, let him be the one to take compassion and put an end to his nephew’s torment.

* * *

_ There is a shadow that haunts the road leading to Ba Sing Se. Silent, formless, it moves ever north. Merchants blame it for their stolen goods. Squadrons are tasked to track it down, but though they scorch the fields and level forests, the shadow and its whispering arrows is never found. _

_ The shadow doesn’t kill, but it leaves destruction of another kind. Frustration, futility, sabotage. Enough damage to rattle the newer troops, and raise the bounty a few more silver coins. _

_ There is one question etched into the dust for the odd caravan, when the shadow guards them during the night and then spirits away. What news of the Avatar? Everyone hears rumors. Every pipe-smoking pub sitter is eager to share. _

_ The shadow never thanks them, but then, it never speaks. Resolutely it continues its trek north. Undetectable; a ghost sprinting across rooftops and scaling canyon walls. _

_ They call it the Blue Spirit. _


	11. Keepers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zuko does not remember his breath of fire, but that’s okay because there are turtle seals everywhere. (Or, the one in which anything with a turtle shell is determined to cuddle Zuko to death.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: So. Much. Fluff.

The funny thing is, he stopped feeling cold sometime in between diving after the turtle seals and dragging himself into the open cave. It’s warm enough that his clothing doesn’t solidify, cold enough that ice hangs off the stalactites. He knows this is a really good time to breathe deep and release the warmth inside, but he can’t feel _anything_. There’s blood snaking down his fingers from grabbing onto the ice, and his arms are twitching, but the only sensation he can fathom is the deep quiver in his chest before grey eclipses his vision and he sees Mother coming into his room, fidgeting with her cape because she’s about to say goodbye and she _can’t_ , he doesn’t have anyone else except....

He wakes up to the claustrophobic weight of earth pinning him down. _Uncle_ , where is he? The Earth Kingdom won’t spare him just because he’s old. He has to get up before they crush Uncle’s hands but he can’t _move!_

The earth gives a rowling honk and Zuko snaps awake, flinching as a wet black nose bops his forehead.

What in Agni’s name...?

Another honking sound and the turtle seal nudges him again, tickling whiskers evoking a sneeze. Ugh! At least it makes the blubbery menace retreat.

The weight shifts on Zuko’s shoulder and suddenly there is a _flipper_ hanging over his arm. A quick glance places two more turtle seals pinning his legs, one sidling into his ribs, maybe three more at his back, and another one trying to crawl over his head.

“Enough!” Zuko shouts, shoving at the leathery shells pinning his arms. He manages to halfway extricate himself from the pile before another seal plops itself onto him. Indignant honks and barks scold him for wriggling, and another shelled beast tries to smother his face.

“Get off of me; I’m not a pup!” Zuko growls. More beady black noses assault him. Do even the Water Tribe's animals feel vindictive against him?

_Remember your breath of_ fire, Uncle's voice reminds him. _It could save your life._

Oh, he’ll breathe fire all right!

Only there’s suddenly seal fur. In his face. He might not be against shoving those yapping leather-farms into their water hole, but he doesn’t want to set them on fire. That’s not fair to — to _anyone_....

A turtle seal nuzzles his scar and starts _licking_ and Zuko’s had enough.

Lunging up onto his hands and knees, he tosses the turtle seal off his back and takes a running leap, yelping when his ankle turns in a bad landing. Sad eyes assault him and the turtle seals shuffle closer.

“Go back to your rookery!” he shouts. He spurts flames to emphasize that he’s not an aquatic descendant and ah, there’s the glorious warmth of his inner flame. (How could he have forgotten?) Spinning on his heel, he stomps to the cascade pouring through the ceiling. Where there’s a waterfall, there’s a current leading from the surface. He can make it if he swims hard enough.

A wriggling nose bumps his leg and Zuko pushes the head away. Gently, though — his hands warm up fast when he’s using his fire breath. The turtle seal gives a forlorn squawk.

“I’m not your litter mate,” Zuko insists. “Go squash somebody else.”

He jumps into the cascade and starts climbing before the turtle seal can call over its friends. (Of course, with his kind of bad luck there are probably cuddly eels or squid hiding in the Northern waters. He climbs a little faster.)

This is one story he’s never telling Uncle.


	12. Lassitude (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Li doesn't do so well in the the North Pole's chill.
> 
> Sokka wishes they'd left him with a nice Earth Kingdom family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: general angst, minor whump and ... humor?
> 
> Rating = R for Sokka's Ridiculously bad jokes.

It's been six days since they left Jeong Jeong, master of doing-nothing-but-creating-problems-that-get-blamed-on-innocent-glowflies. Katara proved that Waterbenders can heal themselves, the Fire Nation proved that no Airbender Temple is safe, and Sokka proved his point that no more Firebending is better for everyone in the long run.

Seriously. Admiral Topknot burned down an entire _forest_ because he couldn't keep his flames to himself.

Fire preventative measures only make Li more irritable, but now he’s an irritable normal person who's not breathing fire on innocent teacups and Avatars, so it’s a fair trade. In fact, Sokka hasn’t seen a puff of smoke since the obsessive Admiral Zhao wrecked his own fleet. The bad part of the trade-off is that Aang won’t stop looking over his shoulder and biting his lip like he wants to talk about hot air balloons and why Li hasn’t spoken to _anyone_ since they left the Northern Temple. (He shouldn’t have anything to complain about — he’s a Firebender! If anything, he should be apologizing for his terrible relatives!)

All of this equates to two days of uneasy silence in the saddle. Li spends most of the time sulking in his corner, Katara aimlessly molding water in hers, and Aang slumping gloomily over the reins. That leaves Sokka with the job of trying to keep everyone's spirits up.

“Hey, Aang!” he snarks, because they just left sent the Fire Nation on the run (again!) and the poor guy really needs to break a smile. “What do you call an Air Nomad who swings through trees? A monk-ey! Haha!”

Aang gets a little more slump-y and Li snorts. Katara groans.

“Really, Sokka?” she says dully.

Yeah, this is all Master Jeong Jeong’s fault.

* * *

  
The closer they get to the North Pole, the more Li resembles a Fire caterpillar. He’s probably never been outside of the Earth Kingdom in his life, Katara realizes, when she pulls another long-sleeved silk shirt out of the chest from the Fire Nation ship and Li accepts it with a wordless shiver. (It’s too big for him, and the cut makes Katara wonder if it was made for a woman. There probably weren’t any teenage boys fighting for the Fire Nation on that ship, however, and it’s warmer than Li’s thin Earth tunic, so she helps him figure out the unfamiliar folds and ties and doesn’t say anything.)

Li rapidly goes from using his blanket as a comfort object to burrowing in everything they find in General Iroh’s casket of treasures. It’s like the old man knew where they were going. There’s sweet, colorful dried fruit, smokey fish and hard-baked biscuits, gloves and weird hats, boots that fit okay once Li wrangles on three pairs of socks, and some sort of sweet, spicy drink that Katara makes the mistake of mixing into their only water skin. (For the next few minutes she and Sokka try to fan their burning tongues, while Aang and Li drain the lot.)

It only gets worse from there.

It’s easy to forget there’s a Firebender in the saddle when there are dams and pulley systems all made of _ice_ and real Waterbenders tug at the ocean like their chi is one with the water. They make bending look so _easy_.

Katara doesn’t think twice about the chest with the Fire Nation emblem in Appa’s saddle, or the fact that Li has gold eyes. No one thinks about Li.

Except the Waterbenders.

“Whoa, hold on!” Aang exclaims when one of the warriors pops back Li’s blanket-hood and evokes a curse. “That’s our friend. He’s okay — he isn’t Fire Nation anymore.”

“Yeah, he’s actually sworn off Firebreathing,” Sokka says, preening at his own wisdom. “We talked about it.”

The Northern Chief refuses to negotiate. Aang threatens to leave if they try to imprison Li. As for himself, Li... doesn’t look surprised.

How long does a person have to run before he expects the world to hate him?

There’s a meal that's supposed to be a welcome feast but turns into a council debate. Katara gets it: General Iroh’s fleet destroyed her home and Kiyoshi Island. Li wouldn't understand why his heritage terrifies every warrior with a bone spear. In fact, he probably spent his whole life in the Earth Kingdom, and the Southern Air Temple was the first time he saw the ruthlessness of his own people.

(Or was it? There are scars that Katara still doesn’t want to think about. Scars so numerous and faded that Li wasn’t even self-conscious when she helped him with his shirt. Burn patches and pink slash marks, a raised lump like someone did a poor job cutting an arrow from his shoulder, a triangle just underneath the rib cage, something that was definitely like bear claws snaking down his left arm and his shoulder, and more little dots and blemishes than Katara had seen on the oldest warriors. Scars have stories, and very few of Li’s are from nature. Besides, Jet implied that the Fire Nation wasn’t worth saving, and Li.... Well, actually Li _argued_ with him. That doesn’t say much for his loyalties now, even if he did run away from Admiral Zhao.)

The whole matter is too confusing, too quickly. Because there were Firebenders swept away in a flood, but also soldiers who gave them provisions and a cure for rain sickness. One Fire Nation general brought an army to the Northern Air Temple, while another set the Avatar free. One tried to kill Katara on a charred beach, another taught the Avatar Firebending. And then there’s _Li_.

Katara picks at her meal and lets Sokka and Aang argue with the elders. She doesn’t know what to think.

* * *

“This is stupid,” Sokka grumbles, pacing in the small, arching room like there are chains in the walls and no windows. “What’s he gonna do? Shiver everything apart?”

“It’s just precautionary,” Aang says, concentrating on the wood in his hands that is swiftly being pared into a formless stick. “I’m sure they’ll let us out once they get to know Li better.”

He yelps when the knife slips and Katara rolls her eyes, a handful of glowing water instantly sealing the gash in the Airbender’s thumb. Super useful, if she hadn’t been repeating the trick for the last hour.

“Aw, I thought I could make a new bison whistle,” Aang mourns, looking disdainfully at the flattened, splintering hunk of driftwood in his palm.

“Let an expert try it,” Sokka insists, snatching away the knife and the splintering scrap. Funny, they leave a Waterbender and a pointy object in the room, and it’s the guy who won’t crawl out of his blanket huddle that worries them. “You know we can leave, right? We don’t _have_ to stay in here all day.”

“I don’t have training until dawn,” Aang snaps. “It’s not fair for them to make Li the only prisoner.”

“At least he has a comfortable room!” Sokka argues. “Furs! Food! What more could anyone ask for?”

“Uhh, a fire pit?” Aang proposes.

“Key words, _ice shelf_ ,” Sokka intones. “Unless you want to swim with the turtle seals, fire is _out_.”

“Li’s cold all the time now,” Aang complains. “That can’t be good for a Firebender!”

“Well, until Mister Grumpy Mustache decides to show leniency to firecrackers, we’re kinda in a bind,” Sokka says, flopping back against Li like the furry lump is a comfy reclining bench. Definitely not cuddling, even if he is offering a little extra body heat. “Aang, this isn’t a prison. They’re just keeping him under guard until they know he isn’t going to melt their fort. I would too, if I hadn't seen him volunteer at the Air Temple.”

“No one likes to be alone,” Aang mumbled, tucking his chin into his folded arms.

“So, he won’t be,” Sokka volunteers gallantly. “I’ll stay here with him. You and Katara go do your bendy stuff.”

“You would do that?” Katara says uncertainly. “But I thought you wanted to see Princess Yue.”

Sokka cringes, looking with dismay at the flattened disk he stole from Aang. It looks kinda like a fish, and with a few tweaks he might be able to make it a passable trinket.

“Nah, I’ll be good here,” he says, concealing his dread of spending the next few days conversing with a monotonous ice block while Katara and Aang learn how to fight. “At least I won’t have to get up at sunrise.”

Katara and Aang look suitably relieved. The ice block behind Sokka doesn’t say anything.

That probably isn’t a good thing.

* * *

  
“Hey, Li! How does the ocean spirit greet the moon spirit? It waves!”

Li doesn’t even puff at the joke. Sokka pulls a face and flips a blanket fold over the guy’s pasty face. No reaction. At least he’s got Li sitting up, and he isn’t shivering as much now that there’s a source of body heat pressed against his shoulder. Not that acting as a personal fire pit is going to be fun for very long. Aren’t Firebenders supposed to be naturally toasty?

“What did the fisherman say when he landed a bad catch?” Sokka posed. “What a load of tripe!”

Yeah... glowflies must not be familiar with coastal idioms. Maybe something closer to home.

“What did the cook say when he grabbed the wrong jelly jar? Blast it!”

That one almost gets him a smile. Score one for the Water Tribe! Beaming, Sokka forges ahead. “How do you ride out a thunderstorm? You hold onto the rains.”

Okay, back to sleepy confusion. But someone has a pretty laugh....

“Princess Yue?” Bolting to his feet, Sokka tries to smooth down his hair and brush frost off his butt and winds up mixing up the two in a humiliating fashion.

Yue only looks amused, giggling again before smoothing her face into a benevolent smile. “Your jokes are wonderful.”

“Uh.... yeah?” Hastily Sokka wrangles down his wolftail — properly this time. “I know some better ones! What do you get when you turn a turtle seal onto its shell?”

“I don’t know,” Yue says sweetly.

“A backflipper!”

Pale eyebrows shoot up incredulously, but Yue smiles anyways. She glides inside and crouches down, folding the blanket out of Li’s eyes. “The Fire Nation hasn’t set foot in our fortress in eighty-five years.” Sympathy touches her expression and Sokka loves her a little more. “You must be so cold with the sun so far in the sky.”

Some of the familiar snappishness returns to Li’s expression. “A little cold can’t keep me down.”

Yue cringes and Sokka doesn’t blame her at all. A dying frog would definitely sound healthier.

“Maybe so, but I’ll bet even the Fire Nation’s palace can’t rival our gardens,” Yue challenges. “Perhaps you’d like to see them for yourself.”

“You have gardens here?” Sokka says dubiously. “You mean sea prune clusters, right? Frozen seaweed?”

 _Sigh!_ He could listen to that laugh all day.

“Why don’t you come along?” Yue says, and she tugs Li up by his arm, nudging the bewildered Firebender towards the door. “Don’t worry, my guards know the safest paths. You won’t walk off an ice shelf.”

“Erm....” Because this is the princess. Inviting a Firebender. On a tour of a frozen garden.

Is it just him or is she crushing on Li? “I... love gardens!” Sokka states, rushing to hold the door open for Yue. “Tended a few acres myself. Gotta love... harvesting... plant harvests.”

Li gives him a look that could mean ‘ _You are a loser’_ or ‘ _Please have mercy and lock me back up._ ’ Yue lingers behind him until he’s compelled to move. (Still in his blankets. He’s a sniffling, fluffy banshee.)

“I wish to show our guests the merits of our culture,” Yue says, and the guards just move aside like she told them to sweep snow out of her path. Li does not look confident in the stability of his future. Sokka’s not sure about this either, but Yue is beckoning and he’d follow that sweet voice into the heart of the Fire Nation.

Turns out Li can go just about anywhere if the chief’s daughter is one of his guards.

* * *

Warmth.

Floral scents (not jasmine, but something close) and grass under his palms, loose earth gritting his fingernails and _finally_ he can lose the blankets and scarves and heavy, clumsy boots. Zuko plants his knees in the soft earth and just _breathes_.

“You’re trusting us in your sacred grounds?” Sokka asks, keeping his voice low as if he’s forgetting that Zuko grew up with Jet whispering behind his back. “Isn’t that....? You don’t think your dad will get mad?”

“I will explain everything to my father,” Yue reassures him. “Besides, I don’t think he means us any harm.”

She’s talking about him, Zuko realizes after a beat. That’s... stupid and lacking in all self-preservation. Why would she trust a Firebender? He could hurt her!

(He wouldn’t.)

How did she _know?_

“Kinda don’t want to ask this,” Sokka says for him, “But how do you know you can trust him?”

Yue gives a little laugh, and for a moment the fish seem to tremble as if sharing her mirth. “Tui and La. They danced around the pond when you arrived. It can only mean a good omen. Besides,” she added, a frown deepening her voice, “It’s uncouth hospitality to freeze our guests. The guards can watch Li just as easily while he's here.”

Zuko doesn’t think the chief will agree, but he’ll enjoy this for as long as it lasts. The sun filters through the clouds just right, as if the spirits gathered the sunbeams and sowed them into this one patch of earth. Zuko hasn’t felt this warm since they left the Northern Air Temple. Closing his eyes, he spreads his hands in the velvety grass and lets his shoulders relax, soaking in the light.

* * *

Li is the only person who _isn’t_ scowling when Aang slinks into the arched room of ice blocks that night. Because Katara is learning kidsie stuff, Chief Mustache is a bigoted old goat, Sokka’s girlfriend apparently spent the entire day talking to a Firebender for some sort of “cultural exchange,” and Li got hot chocolate. This is so not fair.

“Princess Yue is... different from the others,” Li ventures to say, and that’s the first time he’s spoken to Aang in three days.

Sokka looks fit to burn the blanket heap.

* * *

Chief Arnook is also unhappy that evening.

His long-lost love was thrown back in his face in the form of a snappy Waterbender. A female Waterbender.

His daughter lightly announced that the Fire Nation prisoner is making use of the sacred garden.

And someone seems to have liberated the rest of the sweet chocolate hoarded from the last free trade one hundred years ago.

Hahn looks prepared to _accidentally_ send a Firebender on a top-secret, fatal mission.

* * *

Admiral Zhao is furious with his officers’ incompetence.

The Yuyan Archers have mysteriously vanished, along with Prince Iroh’s personal warship.

The pirates he tasked with finding Prince Zuko were cross-hired to smear blasting jelly across the hulls of his fleet.

He is exactly twenty-three battleships short of an invasion force.

Fire Lord Azulon is one escaped Avatar short of selecting a new admiral for his navy.

* * *

Zuko is confused. He doesn't remember proposing.

He's happy to hear about Yue's engagement, of course. Hahn must be a fine warrior, to merit a chief's daughter.

Why are girls always crying?

Chief Arnook will not be held responsible when his future son-in-law mangles the sacred-garden-encroaching prisoner.

* * *

Sokka is actively _not talking_ to anyone.

He's also obsessively sharpening his boomerang.

And volunteering for dangerous missions.

Aang just wants to know where the hot chocolate came from and why Princess Yue always has a stash handy when Li is in the garden.

* * *

Katara has a secret.

(Besides being a Waterbending Master at heart, because everyone knows that by now.)

If she sneaks in quietly and sits for a while, Li will smile and share that glorious drink that somehow makes her feel better as the full moon approaches.

Yue starts showing more teeth when the other girl enters Li's sanctuary.

* * *

Hahn has a heart attack.

Li looks like someone punched him in the face with fire. Really hot, red fire that's spreading all the way to the tips of his ears.

He's just sitting there with a full chocolate mug and this goofy grin that makes Sokka want to slap him. Into a fishing hole.

Yue is being weirdly absent.

Sokka is going to drag a certain Firebender back to a certain Fire Nation ship and beg them to drop him off in the Earth Kingdom.

* * *

(Jet sneezes and looks around for the devious little twit who's talking about him behind his back.) **

* * *

Prince Iroh is strangely absent.

Which may or may not explain why ten more of Zhao's ships lit on fire last night.

The Fire Lord is going to hear about this.

Fire Lord Azulon is too busy electing new officers for his dwindling navy.

* * *

"They're magic fish?"

"Uh... kinda? I think. Yue said they carry the spirits of the moon and the ocean."

"They look like normal fish. Juicy, tasty normal fish."

"Don't."

"... Why are your arms wet?"

"... Yue said I could hold one?"

"Dang it, Li! You can't just pick up magical fish and cuddle them! Are you trying to set the Spirit World on fire?"

* * *

The Fire Nation attacks. It's a ... moderate invasion force.

"I took out a dozen and there's still more," Aang wheezes.

"Not to worry," Chief Arnook reassures him. "The invasion force at the start of the war was much more imposing."

Zhao would throttle his helmsman, but right now he has a fish to bag.

* * *

Zuko has one job, and Yue trusts him with this so he's not going to mess up. He just watches the fish, black circling white, until his limbs relax and he has to shake himself awake.

The fish break their formation in a sudden flurry of splashing before returning to their lazy circle.

That's... probably not a good omen.

* * *

Zhao will not waste his time swimming through fishing holes and scouting out turtle seal lairs. He melts the ice walls that stand in his way.

There's a trite garden defying the natural order of the elements, poorly defended by three guards. Now one guard.

The remaining "guard" has golden eyes.

Zhao can still kill the moon spirit. After he's finished holding the prince's head under the sacred waters.

* * *

It's Sokka's job to protect the princess, so that means he's also tasked with checking in on Li because Yue starts getting "bad feelings."

He pokes his head around the wall just in time to see Admiral Zhao raise a hand like he's going to boil the water with the fish (and Li) still in it. 

Boomerang does its job, but the fish still manage to get all the credit.

Tui and La are quite satisfied tail-smacking a pompous admiral in the face.

* * *

Yue does not run to Sokka after his display of heroic manliness. 

Okay, so maybe Li is a little bit drowned so it's natural for girls to worry about him.

That is **_not_** how lungs work stop ( _kissing_ ) breathing into him!

Hahn might just open traitorous negotiations with the admiral he dragged out of the water prison.

* * *

Li has a secret.

A proposal that may not be quite all truth but nobody knows that his uncle kicked him out so yeah, it's the future.

Plus, he definitely remembers most of the main water gates and sewer shafts under the caldera.

Chief Arnook is all in favor of forming a marriage treaty with the imminent Fire Lord.

And reopening the trade routes for more exotic beverages.

* * *

Princess Yue has a new necklace.

It's definitely a melted-down version of a painted teacup and it looks like a five-pronged flame and _how_ does fire do that?

Sokka really must insist that Li stay behind to help the Northern Water Tribe with their suicidal invasion plans. They can handle Sozin's comet without him. Piece of cake! How hard can it be, with most of the Fire Nation's navy ready to be stripped for parts?

Aang gets a one-up on the vote — he really needs his Firebending teacher if he's going to start training again.

* * *

There's a wanted poster for a kid with gold eyes.

The picture is terrible, but that doesn't keep Smellerbee from _threatening_.

Jet throws down his last stupid pot and "liberates" a pair of Dao swords. 

They're hiring themselves out as mercenaries and dragging Li to the quietest corner of the South Pole, where they'll pose as fishermen until the rest of the royal family chokes on their own comet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Regarding the asterisk... ** There is an old superstition in Japan that a sneeze means someone is talking about you.


	13. Magnetism (Fire Lily AU/Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU of Freedom Fighter AU featuring photosynthetic!Zuko 
> 
> They're not keeping him. Even if he doesn't eat nearly what he ought to and keeps dumping his portion into the nearest undefended bowl. Even when it rains and he starts fading and nobody else wants him.
> 
> He's still a Firebender.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MuffinLance's photosynthetic!Zuko has struck again and now it's creeping into the Freedom Fighter AU. (Which makes this an AU of an AU, which is hurting my brain with all sorts of bunny trails and vibrant possibilities.) 
> 
> Grow, baby plant!Zuko. Soak in the sunlight (and try not to make Jet panic).
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: some violence

“Jet.”  
  
Longshot won't call his attention to something he can take care of by himself. Jet looks to the side and then further back, narrowing his eyes when he spots the archer stooped over something lumpy and nearly as bleached as the wilted rice paddy. Some poor soul left to the crows. Fire Nation castoffs.

Sighing resignedly, Jet shoulders his bag and turns back. There are enough rocks planted by those savages to offer a decent burial, at least. It’s not their first ritual.  
  
“Breathing,” Longshot blurts out, glancing up with wide eyes, and Jet _looks_.  
  
Boots peeling apart at the soles. Blanched tunic worn to bare threads. The dirt is practically part of the kid, except for paler streaks where tears crafted a ghoulish mask.  
  
“No blisters,” Longshot remarks, carefully turning the kid’s head.  
  
“Fire Nation.” It’s obvious, even before Jet checks for gold. Only a Firebender wouldn’t be affected by this heat (although Jet’s seen soldiers in red armor, swollen by the sun. Not all of them dead).  
  
“Small,” Longshot comments, comparing his hand to filthy, aristocratically delicate fingers. They’re relatively the same size, probably close in age, and the kid isn’t much thinner despite the state of his shoes. Odd.  
  
“He’s old enough to fight,” Jet assesses. He unsheathes his knife, feeling one more time for a pulse. (It’ll be easier if he doesn’t have to do it, but he will. One less Torcher to grow up into a soulless officer.)  
  
Yellow eyes fly open, blinking feverishly before lazing over Jet’s face. The Firebender opens his mouth, swollen tongue darting out, and then he’s out again.  
  
“Thirsty,” Longshot says in revelation, which is a waste of vocabulary because Jet _knows_ , a simpleton could tell the kid is dying of thirst and —  
  
“What are you doing?” Jet hisses as Longshot upends his waterskin over the grimy face.  
  
Longshot gives him a look that says he refuses to share any more audible information, but feel free to observe and learn. Within seconds the little sparkshooter scrunches up his face and bats a hand, lapping the filthy streams around his mouth and blindly searching for the source. Longshot is humoring a dead man.  
  
“Is that necessary?” Jet says between grit teeth.  
  
“Thirsty,” Longshot repeats, beaming.  
  
“He’s a Firebender,” Jet states. “We can’t leave him here.”  
  
_Alive_ , he means.  
  
_Alone_ , Longshot deviously latches onto.  
  
No. No, no, no, no.  
  
Longshot gives the kid the waterskin and gathers his legs beneath him, looking up like he expects Jet to help him carry a highly combustible object through a dry rice paddy.  
  
“He’ll burn down the camp,” Jet insists. Firebenders are bred to kill, producing sparks in the cradle. “We can’t take that risk.”  
  
Longshot looks around the dry, stubbly field and then at the Firebender’s unblemished sleeves. “No fire.”  
  
Why. Is this so hard to understand.  
  
Longshot tries to lift the kid in his own lanky arms and Jet finally pushes him aside before he can hurt himself. He slings the kid over his own shoulder (how is he this light and not a walking skeleton?) and glares at Longshot’s unrepentant smile.  
  
“We're not keeping him.”  
  


* * *

  
  
They’re still not keeping him.  
  
Even though the kid doesn’t eat half the portion the others expect ( _when_ he eats, and Jet’s starting to catch the moments when the Firebender bribes his kids by dumping his portion into the nearest unattended bowl — Pipsqueak encourages this behavior, while Longshot shovels it back), and even though he gets singled out and nearly deep fried by the first party of soldiers that ambush their camp, and even though he tries to run ( _where?_ ) every so often at sunrise and Jet has to carry him back when he twists his ankle or gets lost, he’s not staying.  
  
They can’t keep a Firebender. Not when all the kid has to do is sneeze and sparks spray all over his hands. (Smellerbee starts carrying a waterskin everywhere. The kid gets wet. Jet thinks it’s funny.)  
  
At first Jet tries to make excuses. Food is priority. They can’t feed another kid without some contribution, and no Torcher is going to be trusted on a night raid. It’s a sensible reason to cut loose ties. (Preferably in a literal, permanent fashion.)  
  
Only the kid somehow overhears Jet’s proposition and stops eating. Entirely.  
  
Longshot puts a double portion in his own bowl and forces a pair of chopsticks into disturbingly artistic fingers. (There are callouses, but not from a clumsy, disposable iron blade like most child soldiers. How did a gold-eyed rich boy get this far?)  
  
Fed up with the glares coming at him from _all_ his kids, Jet accedes. They’re close to the border anyways, and they can drop the Firebender off at a nice cottage where the man of the house probably won’t stab him with a carving knife.

Probably.

The kid starts curling up between Longshot and Sneers when frost flattens what's left of the grass, and Jet takes a little longer to think about it.

  
It’s late autumn when he starts to seriously consider the farmhouse proposition, because the kid gets sick. Bad.  
  
It starts with a string of rainy days. A brutal summer rolls into a blanket cloud and while Jet’s kids romp around yipping in the first cloudburst they’ve seen in months, the Firebender huddles under a tree and shivers, water dripping off his nose.  
  
Not unusual behavior for a Torcher.  
  
The clouds stick around and the ground gets muckier. The little sparkshooter suddenly decides he’s tired of Pipsqueak hovering at his shoulder and starts speed-devouring his meals, perking up like a yapping puppy kitten the instant Jet sets the pot over their makeshift rock stove. (And no, he can’t help with the fire, in fact he cannot touch anything remotely capable of producing flame — Longshot, please explain that yes, clothing and mud and _air_ is flammable and any more sass is going to be answered with a hungry belly — stop glaring, Longshot, whose side are you on anyways?)  
  
Days of rain roll into weeks, and it’s Smellerbee who tugs on Jet’s sleeve and whispers that the kid is getting thin. Bony thin, like every scrap of flesh is absorbing into his skeleton, which can’t be right, because they’re finally getting decent portions as the rain brings out mushrooms and chalky tree nuts and grassy stalks of garlic.

The kid inhales his portion and half of Longshot’s, and he starts _listing_.  
  
Six weeks of rain and everybody gets snappish. Except the Firebender, who sleeps by the fire and doesn’t even sneeze steam anymore. Jet chucks a blanket over him and stays up for a while, staring into the rain. There’s no answer for this.  
  
They find a cottage and Jet carries the kid to the door. He doesn’t expect much — a bad harvest means winter will be cruel, but some people will give anything to replace small hands and sweet voices buried under smoldering rubble.  
  
At first the gruff old woman shakes her head. Then she grabs onto the kid’s face and pries his eyelids open. She smiles when he scowls sleepily and tries to push her hand away.  
  
“I’ll take him.”  
  
Jet backs down the path. The old woman follows him and coos over the lost child, tells him she can use a strong hand, that no one else will want the halfbreed, that she can offer him silver. He tells her to be gone, in the foulest manner he knows, and she curses him and tries to wrench the kid out of his hands. Aims for his face, clawing at golden eyes.  
  
The kid doesn’t sleep at all that night. He trembles, clinging to the arms around him, like he trusts them not to throw him away but he's not _sure_. Jet looks over the messy topknot and reassures his kids with a silent nod.  
  
They’re not trying that again.  
  
The kid doesn’t get better. Jet and Pipsqueak take turns carrying him. Smellerbee and Longshot make him eat. (He always perks up after meals. For a little while.) Sneers watches him when they have to resupply.  
  
There’s nobody to guard the little sparkshooter when the Fire Nation attacks.  
  
Jet looks over just as a soldier grabs the kid by his topknot and lifts a fireclad fist.  
  
He finds himself standing over the body with no memory of moving, his hook swords buried in burbling flesh.  
  
The kid didn’t even notice.  
  
Hours later, when the blood is caked on Jet's hands and he still can’t stop staring at the wanted poster, Longshot touches his shoulder. The archer’s eyes are wet.  
  
“Not long,” Longshot warns him.  
  
He shouldn’t have gotten attached. They should have left the brat in the field; let nature takes its course. There’s no place in the world for a Firebender.  
  
Jet slings an arm around Longshot as the archer sniffles, and he tosses the wanted poster aside.  
  
It’s just a kid, and the whole world hates him.  
  
There’s a knife at his belt, and a long shift ahead. If he cuts a vein he can say it was a hidden injury. Fire Nation savages. The kid won’t feel a thing.  
  
He spends a long time holding the bony wrist and counting heartbeats, a naked blade cradled loosely in his free hand.  
  
He gives the next shift to Sneers and goes off to hack at something that won’t bleed.  
  
Finally, late into winter (so late it’s nearly spring and they’ve seen nothing but mist and mud for months), sunlight tickles the soggy earth. Longshot carries the kid outside and plops down onto a rock, turning his face into the glow.  
  
It’s a nice way to go, Jet thinks, slashing a whetstone across his knife. Fresh open air, friendly arms, sunlight.  
  
Sour acid burns the back of his throat. He should’ve finished it when the Firebenders attacked. Longshot shouldn’t have to hold the kid through his last breath.  
  
(They never would have forgiven him. They would have _known_.)  
  
He could’ve borne it. This long, slow torture isn’t fair. Not to the little unwanted prince. Not to anyone.  
  
The kid doesn’t die that afternoon.  
  
He actually murmurs in his sleep and flops halfway into the fire that night, and there’s an embarrassing moment when everyone stares in shock before Jet yanks the kid out and starts batting at the flames.  
  
Sneers opens his mouth and thinks better of it. Jet doesn’t need anyone to tell him these are fresh burns and not only is the Firebender fire-prone, but he’s also lacking in any sense of self-preservation. There’s no point in giving him back to the Fire Nation, where he’ll probably trip into a line of torches — if his own parents don’t try to kill him first.  
  
The savages don’t deserve him.  
  
Longshot takes the kid out to greet the sunlight the next day, and the next. They only get light for a couple hours, but it’s enough to soften tempers for a little bit.  
  
The sparkshooter blinks hard on the third afternoon and opens his eyes.  
  
Pipsqueak drops a rock on his own foot.  
  
Smellerbee grabs onto Jet’s arm and drags him outside to look.  
  
Longshot smiles like he’s known it all along.  
  
“Firebenders are sunflowers.” Grinning with all his teeth, the archer declares, “I named him Li.”  
  
And that is the final argument.


	14. Nabbed (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> General Fong wants a personal audience with "Prince Li." Li doesn't come back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: some violence

  
  
Chief Arnook is a very generous future father-in-law. Aang is given Waterbending scrolls, Katara a fancy water vial capped into a girly necklace, and Li lands them a decked out ship with crates of salty snacks and sea prunes and turtle seal furs because he’s practically _Prince Li_ now and Sokka has to spend the next week of his life enduring a long voyage with a Firebender. In blue. On a flammable ship.  
  
“You should be happy,” Sokka gripes, rubbing the shoulder Chief Arnook clapped because apparently that’s his only gift from the cranky mustache man. “You’re engaged. To a princess.” A princess with benefits, Hahn mentioned, and now that Sokka’s attentions have been rebuffed he kinda has to agree. He snags a piece of blubbered seal jerky to soothe his ruffled stomach. They need more of these benefits.  
  
“It wasn’t a victory,” Li says softly, listlessly scratching a wilted piece of wheat grass across the ship’s railing. It’s either a weed from the sacred garden or someone’s got a pocketful of Earth Kingdom grass stashed away and that’s just weird. “The Fire Nation will send more ships, and this time the Avatar won’t be there to defend them.”  
  
“Eh, I think the chief can handle it,” Sokka argues. “I mean, most of the fleet is under the water now.”  
  
Why is Aang glaring like he just declared open war on sky bison?  
  
“My Uncle might’ve been on one of those ships,” Li says faintly.  
  
Oh.  
  
_Oh._  
  
“Wait, you have _living_ relatives?”  
  
Okay, that gobsmacked look is undeserved. How was he supposed to know?  
  
Aang swallows when they pass another iron wreck. “I didn’t know your uncle served the Fire Lord — in the navy,” he adds in a panic, because of course anyone whose name isn’t Li is going to be conscripted under the Fire Lord. “What... what does he look like?”  
  
“Doesn’t matter,” Li says, hugging his knees to his chest. “I’d rather not know.”  
  
Averting his eyes, Sokka pulls out a knife and starts whittling slivers off Aang’s bison-whistle-fish carving.  
  
They trounced the Fire Nation. It should feel like a victory. Why does Li always have to mess things up?

* * *

  
  
Aang dreams of iron plates under his feet and water rushing over his head and terror as his friends are swept into the ocean by the Avatar’s fury. When Aang steps onto the deck to clear his head, Li is already there, leaning over the railing with a red blanket folded over his shoulders.  
  
“I’m sorry about your people,” Aang says, mimicking the Firebender’s stance. “I know we were fighting, but....”  
  
“They didn’t have to die,” Li says in a choked voice.  
  
Swallowing, Aang hangs his head. “I know. I thought I was helping the Water Tribe but I —“  
  
“They shouldn’t have had to fight!” Li presses on heedlessly. “They didn’t choose to fight on Northern waters. Their leaders were spineless and hung up on stupid orders. They — they’ll never find their way to the Spirit World, not without the sun to guide them. They died for nothing.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Aang whispers.  
  
“When I’m Fire Lord, I’m going to end this war,” Li vows. “I don’t care how — I’ll pull out every soldier and make them stop fighting. We started this war and it’s time someone ended it.”  
  
“Wait, how could you become the Fire Lord if you’re not....” Aang’s jaw drops. The Dragon General’s sudden change of heart. Chief Arnook’s eagerness to marry off his daughter to a Fire Nation fugitive. It all makes sense.  
  
“Wait, you’re the missing Fire Nation prince and you were hiding out in the Earth Kingdom this whole time?”  
  
Li winces, but it’s too late for damage control. Katara drops a steaming teacup and rounds on them with a wild expression.  
  
“You’re **_what?”_**  
  
Well, at least he isn’t the spitting image of his murderous grandfather.  
  


* * *

  
  
“You’re the Fire Lord.”  
  
“Not yet.”  
  
“You’re the _future_ Fire Lord. And you didn’t tell anybody?”  
  
“Chief Arnook is aware.”  
  
“Does Jet know?”  
  
Li (do they have to call him Zuko now?) turns all different shades of red and his hands gather into fists. “Can we just... not talk about them?”  
  
Oh, so Mister Anti-Freedom Fighter wants to pretend the Earth Kingdom stint never happened. Sokka can play along.  
  
“So when you’re Fire Lord, you make up all the rules, right?”  
  
“That’s ... not exactly how it works. And I’d rather still be called Li, if it’s all the same. People shouldn’t know I’m alive yet.”

"Right, because last I heard you _'Can't go home_.' Or was that another convenient alibi for being a royal jerk?"

"That doesn't mean I won't _try_ ," Zuko-Li says nastily.  
  
Because that sounds vaguely like usurpation and familial homicide. Seriously, being future Fire Lord means immeasurable power and the ability to crush nations with a big enough army. Speaking of armies....  
  
“I think we need to lay down some new ground rules,” Sokka declares. “Starting with, no flaunting rank on the Appa team — I’m still in charge. Also, no more burning villages, invading the South Pole, attacking helpless fishies, sending bounty hunters after Aang.... _What?_ ”  
  
Li — Zuko-Li — looks paler than normal.  
  
“Stop yelling at him, Sokka!” Aang scolds. “He didn’t have anything to do with the Fire Nation attacks!”  
  
“Yeah, well someone needs to have a serious talk with his uncle,” Sokka answers. “I’d like to have one Appa adventure without someone shooting fireballs at us.”  
  
Li looks... injured. Because it’s Zuko-Li now, and Sokka just brought up his possibly dead relative.  
  
Well, that’s a great way to open peace talks.

* * *

  
  
“Look, he’s probably fine. Big important general and all; I’m sure he was too busy to engage in a measly little cold war.”  
  
“Do you have to keep bringing it up?”  
  
“I’m just saying —“  
  
“Do you want me to fight you because I will!”  
  
“..... The fish slapped Zhao, by the way. In case you didn’t know.”  
  
“He deserved it.”  
  
“You’re not even going to act surprised?”  
  
“They’re spirit fish. Of course they’re going to beat up the bad guy.”  
  
“So if the Dragon General isn’t bad that means he’s probably just getting a massage on some —“  
  
_Erk!_  
  
“Li, let go of my brother right now! Can’t you two stop fighting for one minute?”  
  


* * *

  
  
Li is a terrible Firebending teacher.  
  
He knows the first half of some katas and the last half of others, so he just puts them together in some weird, windy dance and tells Aang that it’s better to practice some parts of the form than nothing at all.   
  
Aang just — goes with it, his eager little Avatar brain latching onto rhythms until he just ditches the routine and goes freeform, blending ancient Fire Nation dances with scythes of flame that leave sensible non-Firebenders and hapless Momos scurrying for cover.  
  
He gets away with that for five minutes.  
  
Turns out Li — Prince Zuko (no _wonder_ Yue went gaga eyes for him, the shifty little scorcher) — is a creature of habit, and he will sacrifice himself to the water spirits before he lets Aang bob around without a proper, monotonous sequence. It’s actually safer — the fire swipes are more contained, but Aang still scorches the underbrush in four different directions while Li manages a fairly forward approach.  
  
He’s losing a lot of hair thanks to his pupil, though.  
  
“I’m starting to believe Master Jeong Jeong’s lecture about prioritizing Earthbending,” Sokka admits. “Maybe we need to put a cap on the sparkles — just for now.”  
  
He won’t suggest not-Firebending again — especially now that Zuko-Li has a terrifying bunch of future in-laws. (And how is that going to work? Either somebody is going to move to a warmer climate or somebody else is going to spend the rest of his life in a tiny patch of garden and Sokka highly doubts the Water Tribe will build the future Fire Lord a summer house on their sacred hotspot). Besides, Sokka respects certain concepts like self-preservation and the snapdragon gets steamy when people rile him.  
  
Like twirling Airbenders with no sense of personal space.  
  
“Are you trying to kill your allies?” Li shouts. “Move forward; this isn’t a dance!”  
  
“But the way you move your arms is just like the Camelephant Strut.”  
  
“It’s not the — how do you even know Fire Nation dances? They’ve been outlawed for two — three — seven years.”  
  
Which gives Sokka an inkling about what kind of homework a rejected prince was up to before he signed up for the Earth Kingdom mutineers.  
  
“Dancing is just expressing your chi in a more enthusiastic form,” Aang says, throwing himself into a flaming cartwheel. Oh look, his sleeves are on fire again.  
  
“Firebenders are not enthusiastic,” Zuko-Li snaps. He’s nice enough to help swat down the flames, before he grabs the orangey material at the shoulder seams and casually rips off both of Aang’s sleeves. Katara squeaks and covers her eyes. (She’s worked so hard to keep their only set of Air Nomand clothing intact.)  
  
“If you want to throw fire without hurting yourself, you have to maintain a proper stance,” Li explains, demonstrating the same froggy posture Sokka has seen hundreds of times already. “Push forward, not out.”  
  
“But you said to feel the fire and release it. _Out!_ ” Aang argues. “That seems counterproductive to —“  
  
“It’s what they taught me!” Mister Fancy Firebreath finally snaps. He falls into another swoopy, rigid kata that makes Aang look like a skittish colt prancing alongside a sea vulture. His flames are choppier this time, but the heat volume is impressive.  
  
“Your fire gets bigger when you’re angry,” Aang says intelligently.  
  
“I’m not angry!”  
  
Wow, rocks actually _can_ burn.

* * *

Li ... it’s hard to think he has another name now.... relaxes visibly the moment he sees sun-browned skin offset by varying shades of green. Is it Katara’s imagination, or does he almost saunter as he climbs out of Appa’s saddle, like he belongs in a nation built on stone?  
  
“Avatar Aang... Brave Sokka... Mighty Katara... and Prince Li.”  
  
Sokka twitches. Katara slaps his arm before he can say anything stupid. She’s the Mighty Katara, after all. It’s not like she’d associate with the Fire Lord’s grandson.  
  
She’s less impressed with General Fong’s callous regard for the Avatar State and the pressure he puts on Aang to activate a dangerous spiritual reaction. And why do they have to pull Li aside like he’s something special when the Avatar is the reason they’re here in the first place?  
  
If Katara was listening to her inner-Jet suspicions, she might have realized that “Li alone” meant only trouble. But General Fong greeted them with fireworks and tea. He couldn’t be all that different from Chief Arnook.  
  
Li doesn’t rejoin them afterwards.  
  
By evening Aang starts to panic.  
  


* * *

“The prince is enjoying the best of our hospitality,” General Fong says pleasantly. “After hearing about your success at the North Pole, we ourselves wish to open negotiations with the Fire Nation.”  
  
Sokka tugs on Aang’s poncho before he can argue. “Aang, I’m sure he’s fine. He’ll be back tomorrow. We’ll talk about this. Come _on._ ”  
  
There’s a quiet urgency in Sokka’s voice that Aang isn’t used to, so he lets his friends lead him away. As soon as the door to their quarters closes behind them Sokka leans against it and whispers, “How did they know Li was a Fire Nation prince?”  
  
And Aang realizes how badly they’ve messed up.  
  


* * *

  
  
The earth under his feet feels like home. It’s warm enough to shed the parka and wish he could shuck the fur-lined boots. He can’t exactly walk around barefoot, though — maybe in a forest, with friends who scavenged what they could from soldiers’ camps, but he can’t get away with it in a general’s estate.  
  
“Li” isn’t exactly a prince yet, not officially, and Zuko’s surprised that word traveled to the Earth Kingdom so fast. It’s not like they send messenger hawks to the northern tundra. It’s a bit odd when the captain wants to talk to him personally, but he’s held too many informal audiences with a princess who shouldn’t even notice him. (Who brought him back from the Spirit World. Whose eyes shone like zircons framed in moonlight. He didn’t want to leave her behind, but everything was happening so fast — he wasn’t ready for this....)  
  
By the time Zuko sees the wanted poster laid across General Fong’s desk, it’s too late. Strong arms buckle his wrists behind his back and there’s a cloth on his mouth and boots jabbing the back of his knees. Something heady fills his next breath and he crumbles, stone smearing into a grey blur.  
  
“Send word to the admiral,” the guard says behind him, his voice muffling into a low buzz. “We offer the boy for his oath of protection. Take the necessary precautions.”  
  
Admiral means Zhao, harsh orange eyes and hands around his throat. But Zhao is in prison, how can he be here....?  
  
Zuko has to breathe again, and the poison in the cloth overwhelms him.  
  
  


* * *

  
  
The Earth Kingdom praises the Mother of Faces. So good and wise, so generous to the poor, so kind behind her lovely white mask. Always reaching out in solidarity, soiling her soft hands with the filth and tears of the unwanted.  
  
Azula doesn’t share her mother’s stupidity. (Thank Agni, since someone has to draw off the soldiers when they get suspicious and she doesn’t know how Mother keeps shirking them; there can’t be a shrewd thought in her tender, insipid spirit.) The poor will be here no matter how many bowls of rice they fill, and feeding them tonight won’t make them useful, upstanding citizens tomorrow. The poor won’t put themselves in the firing line when Fire Nation tanks roll through the streets. They won’t bow to the Fire Lord when Azula takes her rightful place (someday).  
  
If the Face Stealer is going to waste her time, it’s going to be for something useful. Like preying on the lone Fire Nation battle cruiser that slinks into the dock at dusk. It’s smaller than usual. Someone is trying to avoid detection.  
  
Duplicity always means spoils. Slipping on the hideous mask she crafted for this evening — a child’s visage with cracks lined in red like tears of blood — Azula lights from her perch and slinks towards the approaching entourage. (She likes the face she’s chosen tonight. Perhaps she can recreate it — everything must burn at the end of her jaunt, so they can never trace it back to her. Besides, what would the silly Earth soldiers have to fear if they saw the same face every night?)  
  
There are four ostrich horses approaching with five riders. A prisoner exchange perhaps, or a bounty delivery. Pooh, and they didn’t offer her the chance to collect on the traitorous scum? How else will she fund her little nightly exploits? Plaster and paint doesn’t spring out of the ground.  
  
The Fire Nation soldiers are expecting company, but they’re showing their hand too quickly. There’s a gruff old man at the head (stocky but strong, a general’s armor, too rigid to give the Earth soldiers a fair price) and two officers (cold eyes and scuffed uniforms; they’re used to sullying their hands). Once the bounty is on that ship Azula won’t stand a chance.  
  
She’ll just have to make a few new friends on the road.  
  
Vaulting from the thatched roof, Azula spreads her hand in a form that’s almost natural by now. (It’s elegant and dazzling and she created it all by herself. Mother may gasp like her daughter's a horrid creature but it’s beautiful when it laces around her, sizzling flesh and bubbling everything inside those dull, empty faces. She doesn’t leave their faces intact. It's how she earns her name.)  
  
Only some inept fool intervenes this time, leaping into her path with three arrows already soaring towards her targets. Three soldiers fall off their ostrich-horses, but they aren't dead. Azula takes care of that.  
  
By the time she flips to her feet the last soldier is pinned under blue arrows and the interloper is stealing her bounty. Azula scoffs at the hideous Blue Spirit mask and stamps her foot, gathering lightning. How dare he assume one of her past faces! He can join the fools littering the dust.  
  
Only she misses — she _never_ misses — and blood floods from a slice down her palm as an arrow tickles her ear. The blue shadow darts behind a house and she can’t follow because the Firebenders decide to leave their pretty little safe ship and pursue her, as if she’s an acceptable substitute for their lost prize. Skittering back the way she came, Azula scrambles for the rooftops and then claps her hands, scattering lightning. Let them taste their own boiling flesh!  
  
Only the old man captures her lightning and throws it back, and suddenly there is thunder at her feet and whining in her ears and sparkles of fire seizing her limbs. She can’t even scream as the roof collapses beneath her, or drag herself away as the cruel old man kneels beside her and strips away her mask.  
  
She sees his hateful golden eyes narrow as though in pain, before the darkness consumes her.  
  


* * *

  
  
“Li.”  
  
“Li!”  
  
Tapping on his forehead. Incessant. Insistent. He’s woken up to this before.  
  
_It was just a bad dream_ , is Zuko’s first, hopeful thought. He almost expects to open his eyes to a sun-drenched forest.  
  
It isn't a dream. He’s alone in the Earth Kingdom, sore limbs draped onto a spongy bedroll that screams of economy and just manages to hold back the chill in the floorboards. The room is filled with people; a steady drone of coughs and murmurs and crying children. The person crouched by his bedroll shifts and a prying finger taps his head again.  
  
“Li.”  
  
This time he doesn’t hear wrong and he jerks around, crying out. Because they’re in Gaipan and he _left them_ _behind_ and this feels just like the night when Uncle kicked him out and it _has_ to be a dream.  
  
Tilting his head to the side, the dream figure slaps a hand onto Zuko's forehead, ascertaining what only a handful of people can guess is normal for a “self-combusting glowfly.”  
  
“Longshot?” Zuko chokes.  
  
The archer grins, and Zuko's ready to forget everything. The Avatar, his uncle’s disappointment, the North Pole, everything except _I can go home, they came back for me._  
  
It doesn’t take more than a glance to know that none of the others are close by. The nearby, sleeping faces are unfamiliar — unless there’s a night raid to be had.  
  
“Where’s Smellerbee?” Zuko whispers.  
  
Longshot frowns and looks deliberately to the side. Zuko slumps. He came alone, then. Jet probably kicked him out for siding with a traitor.  
  
“How’d you find me?” Zuko rasps. His mouth tastes vaguely reminiscent of frog slime with an aftertaste of tooth rot, and his head is still fuzzy.  
  
Longshot grimly holds up a poster. Zuko cringes at the poor visage staring above Li's name. The chin is too long and the ears too wide and his expression is pulled down like he drank a whole barrel of bai jiu.   
  
_General Fong called me Prince Li...._  
  
Sucking a breath between his teeth, Zuko tilts his face away from the other tenants and resists the urge to hood himself in the scratchy blanket. He isn’t safe here; not with gold eyes that a common midwife can recognize and a bounty on his head.  
  
Longshot taps his arm and then squeezes in next to him, shoulders and knees touching. Zuko shudders.  
  
“You shouldn’t be here," he whispers. "I’m traveling with the Avatar. He doesn't stay long in any one place, and I'm pretty sure the Fire Nation wants to execute anyone helping him.”  
  
Raising both eyebrows, Longshot raises the flap of a scrappy, oiled satchel. Zuko appraises the glimpse of blue paint and white teeth and whistles low. “You’ve got a bounty on you too, you know. Does Jet know about this?”  
  
Another shrug. Probably a good thing — Jet gets frazzled easily. He’s probably breathing curses at Smellerbee and Pipsqueak for letting their best archer slip away.  
  
“I’m traveling with the Avatar,” Zuko repeats, just to make sure Longshot knows what he’s getting into. “I’m going back.”  
  
Longshot grabs his sleeve and pulls down, but an idle point towards the white-masked woman dishing out jook makes the translation easy. _Fine, but breakfast first._  
  
Warmth floods Zuko’s chest and he leans back, looping the blanket over his head like a prayer shawl. He’s pretty sure Aang won’t leave without his Firebending teacher, but even if the Avatar cuts his losses and runs, Zuko won’t be the one left behind. He’s got his real family back.  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	15. Omission (Mute AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ozai is more efficient in shutting up his heir. Permanently. (Or, the one where Zuko learns to use swords instead of his tongue and is forcibly subjected to peace talks.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: some description of injury

”Just get out there before he breaks something vital.”

“I’d like to make a protest, Sir. We’re out of bruise cream and Kohaku is on strike until the general stops sneezing fire in his infirmary.”

“We all take turns, Tarou.”

“Except the general....”

“What was that?”

“When they bring my ashes home I want them spread in the stupid turtleduck pond.”

“Noted.”

Taking a deep breath, Tarou cinches his gauntlets a little tighter and braces his shoulders, stepping into the death zone. A royal tantrum accompanied by flames is basic training — a snippety teenager with a penchant for close combat (and an innate knowledge of painful nerve clusters) is grounds for mutiny.

Some spoiled brats shout themselves hoarse over life’s inconveniences. Why couldn’t Tarao have been assigned to one of those charmers?

* * *

Zuzu’s constant yapping is his most tedious flaw. Father takes care of that.

Azula watches in stunned silence as the Fire Lord grips his son by the throat and _sears_ , and she resolves never to speak unless required.

* * *

Fire comes from the breath.

Zuko spends three years biting down his own flame, clutching his throat where it still burns deep inside.

Something doesn’t heal right. Eating is hard. Breathing is hard. He’s not spitting fire just because Uncle says it’s the “proper” form.

He paces, kicking and hurling every remotely insentient object, until Lieutenant Jee drags him onto the middle of the deck and starts punching like it’s a fighting ring for flameless peasants.

It’s less daunting without fire lashing in his eyes, and more satisfying when he lands his first right hook and Jee winces. 

Zuko starts pacing the deck more often when he’s annoyed. There always seems to be someone around looking for a good brawl.

* * *

It’s three weeks before Kohaku can coax the boy to swallow something more solid than broth. There’s a flash of agony and betrayal that says he’ll never be trusted again.

The prince will try it anyways, on his own, when Iroh turns music night into mochi night and the boy chews with a red face and wet eyes but he’s going to enjoy himself if it kills him.

Getting him to eat regularly is nearly impossible. Thankfully they have a creative chef and ship with no destination and a hundred ports between here and the nonexistent Avatar. Changming, the cook’s aide, starts lingering in restaurants instead of bars, and flirting with more old grandmothers than cute waitresses. Trial and error proves that Earth Kingdom recipes are the safest. No spice, low salt, and enough flavor to ensure the crew won’t abscond to a tropical island.

Eight months into his exile, the prince finally starts wandering into the mess hall on his own.

* * *

Crewman Huang is conscripted as the royal tailor. Kohaku has better stitches, but he’s used to cutting off limbs and mutilating corpses. After the first bolt of silk is flayed into unrecognizable scraps Huang claims his rights of “would’ve followed the family trade if I wasn’t born shedding sparks” and starts measuring folds and tucks for guaranteed growth spurts. 

Zuko pantomimes high collars. It’s Huang's idea to line them with whalebone. Just in case any cutthroat pirates get below the kid’s Dao swords. Can’t be too careful when the heir to the Fire Nation doesn’t believe in long-range, natural ammunition.

The prince is more concerned about vanity than his own physical health. He smiles anyways when he looks at himself in the mirror, all sharp black lines tempered by maroon and gold.

Oh yeah, Huang's definitely getting himself a civilian occupation after this sea stint is over.

* * *

It’s important not to leave Prince Zuko out of their entertainment, General Iroh insists, but it’s so easy to forget they have a kid on deck. The prince spends the first few weeks huddled in his room or in the infirmary. Even after he migrates to the other decks he's too quiet on his feet. The only way for a kid with that kind of scar to garner attention is to wave around and make people look at him.

Zuko’s not that kind of kid.

They try to remember there’s a prince on board who should probably get some positive reinforcement before he starts brawling for attention. Oh, there he is. Hovering by the Pai Sho board like he’s actually listening while Iroh drones about — how long has he _been there?_

Ju wants to put bells on the sneaky brat’s shoes. Lieutenant Jee mutters something hopeful about training a sabotage unit under the prince's command. Ju tries not to drop a plate of dubious looking bean curd puffs when said prince yanks the Dragon of the West to the starboard railing and gestulates frantically at a beam of light piercing the horizon.

Oh, no. They’re not doing this again.

“I’ll get the lieutenant,” Tarao groans, already twitching like he’s going to be the next one dodging leather-bound fists.

The prince is going to go spastic when he realizes it’s another dead end.

* * *

It’s not another dead end.

Zuko doesn’t know what to do when the Avatar lands in front of him, because the Avatar is _alive_ and he’s a _child_ and what are they supposed to do now?

“I said I surrender. Aren’t you going to say anything?” the Avatar yaps.

“We accept your terms of surrender,” Uncle says, intervening seamlessly like it was his plan to invade the South Pole in the first place.

The Avatar keeps staring at Zuko so he swings around, snapping his fingers for Lieutenant Jee to collect the twit. 

It’s been three years and he finally gets to go home. (Where the least bit of spice will burn his throat and Father will be disappointed that he hasn’t maintained his inner flame and he’ll have to write everything to make his opinion known and this is **_stupid_** but where else can he go?)

“At least you can tell me your name,” the Avatar insists, skipping defiantly like he can float off the ship at any moment. 

“Prince Zuko is not required to answer to a child,” Uncle says, _not helping_ and still taking the pressure off Zuko at the same time. (How does he do that?)

“Zuko, huh? I had a friend named Kuzon — he was a Firebender, too. I’m Aang.”

They’d better get the twit locked up fast. Zuko really needs to punch somebody.

* * *

The Avatar escapes. Tarao is conveniently afflicted with a stomach malady and cannot be moved from his bunk. 

“Unless you want me throwing up on the prince’s boots?” he threatens (with more vivacity than is warranted for his present condition).

Lieutenant Jee resigns himself to a headache and smarting ribs, only to find the deck devoid of pacing princes. A closer inspection and a scowling shrug from Ju reveals the skiff is also missing.

Maybe they’ll be lucky and the Avatar is indeed a pacifist. 

And perhaps the Fire Lord will commemorate a statue in his son’s honor. 

“I’ll tell Guang to turn the ship around,” Ju drawls.

* * *

There’s a Fire Nation ship on Kiyoshi Island.

“Actually, it’s a Fire Nation tugboat,” Sokka ventures.

“What do you want, Zuko?” Aang demands, trying to peek around the skiff as if the rest of the ship will pop out of the water any moment.

Zuko jabs behind him at the open ramp.

Aang shakes his head.

The crazy Firebender (is he a bender if he’s just using swords?) tries to pin him with his freakishly fast Dao blades.

Suki and her warriors plaster the crazy guy into the dust.

“So... can we talk now?” Aang proposes, while Zuko is still spitting out grass in (silent) disgust.

* * *

Prince Zuko is not open to negotiations. Because his hands are tied behind his back and he can’t _say_ anything and he’s not going to bare his throat just to prove to these morons that he’s a pathetic nonbender who could’ve burned down this stupid village if Father hadn’t... if he’d just listened and done what he was told.

“If you’re not going to tell us what you want, why are you following us?” the Avatar demands.

_Because Father promised._

_Because there’s nothing else I can do._

_Because if I don’t the crew will go home and Uncle can’t stick around just because I’m useless and I don’t know how to do anything different._

_Because I’m still confused and I want to know why you’re alive._

Why does a child make the Fire Nation tremble?

“I think we should let the Kiyoshi warriors take care of him,” the Water Tribe boy proposes. “I’m sure they have some pretty impressive interrogation techniques.” 

Zuko narrows his eyes. He’s been through that before. It took the pirates long enough to figure out why he wouldn’t scream.

“No, Sokka,” the pacifist says, much to the boy’s obvious disappointment. “That’s just what the Fire Nation would do.”

That’s just what any _sensible_ person would do, actually. 

“Look, I don’t want to fight,” the Avatar insists — no, _implores_ him. “No one is going to hurt you. I just want to know why you want to kill me.”

If Zuko could, he’d make a sound of disgust. He doesn’t want the Avatar dead. He’s not a monster. He just wants to go home.

Zuko has spent three years expressing himself without a voice, and it’s a difficult habit to break. Without conscious thought he gives the Avatar an exaggerated head tilt, the expression Uncle would recognize instantly as ‘ _You’re talking nonsense, old man, get to it.’_

Aang gasps and Sokka’s eyes boggle.

Too late Zuko realizes the collar doesn’t hide everything; not when the red, finger-shaped creases loop nearly to his jawbone. He ducks his chin into his collar and rocks back, scowling through the blush.

“What... what happened?” Aang whispers. Horror drops his voice another octave. “You can’t talk at all, can you?”

And just like that, as if denying him his hands equivocated them with Earth Kingdom Crushers (because there isn’t any difference, they just haven’t resorted to extreme measures yet), the Avatar scrambles in a mad panic to unwind the cords around Zuko’s hands and slaps a paper and pen before him. The twit's eyes are as large as the lemur’s — is he going to start crying next?

Without knowing exactly why, Zuko scrawls on the cheap parchment, _You’re an idiot._

For trusting him. Because they can't. He'll capture the Avatar the moment he gets an opening.

“That’s something we all knew,” Sokka says, somehow forcing Zuko to pick sides and vouch for the Avatar. So maybe the fabled warrior is a child. He deserves more respect from his allies! “Although to be fair, you kinda scrambled his brains with your sword.”

“Why do you keep hunting us?" the Avatar asks. "I've never done anything to upset the Fire Nation."

Untrue. The Avatar exists, and that in itself is offensive to the Fire Lord. Zuko's spent three years trying to cram his thoughts onto paper, however, and sometimes it just isn't worth it to waste words. 

_My honor,_ he writes simply. _I can't go back home unless I bring the Avatar._

"Guess it's gonna be a long voyage," Sokka snarks. 

"That's... a very specific condition," the Avatar considers. "I mean, I technically wasn't here until a few days ago."

_Tell me about it,_ Zuko slashes onto the paper.

"How long have you been looking for me?"

_Three years this spring._

"But I was in the ice!" the Avatar protests. "What was the point? Everyone thought I was dead!"

That's... a precise conclusion. One that Uncle keeps hinting about over the Pai Sho board while Zuko expressively _does not listen_. 

It's not worth arguing about, so he just blots the paper. And then writes, _Are you coming, then?_

"Is this an open negotiation, or are you going to lock me up again?" the Avatar poses.

Zuko takes a moment to consider how many characters he'll need for a reply. _Fine. Negotiation. On my ship._

"Uh-uh! I'm not leaving Appa to fly by himself!"

Hand gestures apparently do not communicate to Water Tribe illiterates half as well as they do for his crew. He's tired of being on the receiving end of blank stares. _I'm not sitting on your stupid bison!_ Zuko emphasizes, tearing the paper with scribbled strokes.

"Yeah? Well, I'm not getting onto your stupid Fire ship! Why can't Ozai come talk to me himself?"

There are not enough gestures to articulate how ridiculous that idea is, so Zuko upends the table instead.

And has to write on the floor, because apparently they're not done arguing.

They come to a solution. Sort of. The Kiyoshi warriors will post a small squadron and Uncle can bring his personal escort (and more paper), and they will talk nicely and try not to break any more furniture. Zuko doesn't know what they're going to talk about, but he can already guess there's going to be tea and small talk and too much scribbling and Koh take it all, he hasn't eaten since last night and he's _starved_ and he can smell fresh pau buns and egg custard tarts and can they just start serving tea already? 

(It's just as bad as he expects. Uncle is too friendly and Lieutenant Jee asks too many questions and Zuko can't say _anything_ because his hand cramps up somewhere into the fourteenth page. But there are egg custard tarts and crab puffs and ice cold kalenutsco, and the Waterbender is too engrossed in a cup of Uncle's jasmine tea to scowl properly. The Avatar — who has a name, Uncle pleasantly reminds Zuko's most recent scribble — is too chattery and optimistic and why can't they understand that negotiation _is never going to work!)_

This would all be so much easier if he could just _yell_ at the Avatar and get it over with.


	16. Placated (Mute AU/Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Longshot wants to adopt a glowfly. Jet can't say no — not when the Fire Nation scorched the kid's throat and left him out to die. (Freedom Fighter AU/Mute Zuko AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have another AU of an AU, because Longshot has to collect all of the wandering, hurting sunflowers and give them good homes. (A.K.A. Freedom Fighter AU meets Mute!Zuko AU because Neocolai really needs to get out of quarantine and back to work.)
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: Description of Injury

Longshot brings home a child.

One look at the topknot and pale skin and silk collar and Jet shakes his head. They are not sheltering a firebrand. (So the kid’s throat looks like someone tried to hang him and then set the rope on fire before dragging him through the streets. He’s still Fire Nation.)

Who flinches and tries to crawl away when Jet crouches to stir the pot of jook, before he realizes golden eyes are cringing from the flames.

He’s never seen scorchers shy away from their own element.

“I don’t think he’s a Bender,” Smellerbee voices, as she helps Longshot pick wax from a slurry of honeycomb. (It’s a surefire remedy for burns, and they don’t have any aloe.) “Maybe he’s from the colonies.” 

A halfbreed, then. Probably targeted for his unfortunate heritage. Jet won’t be ashamed for jumping to the same conclusion. (But he resolves to stop growling every time the kid blinks.)

They don’t give him a name, because it’s not permanent yet. The kid won’t eat anything more solid than jook, and that in small bites. His teeth clack with feverish chills, and his eyes stream tears whenever he sneezes or coughs. Nights are spent in shifts so they can turn him every couple hours; he’s too steeped in shock to move himself.

He never makes a sound.

“He’s going to die without a healer,” Smellerbee warns.

There was a healer once, as testified by the soiled bandages they had to cut away to release the infection. The silk garments are too new and the boots barely worn. Whoever dumped this poor sufferer, they were close by, and they didn’t expect him to live long.

He lives, though. Somehow. Miraculously, as if defying death is just a natural instinct of inborn obstinacy.

Longshot pesters a midwife until she shows him how to find goldenseal and ginseng and oregano, and then steep them to make a paste for the skin and tea for the stomach. Smellerbee slices through the kid’s silk finery and threads ties through the front so they don’t have to pull the fabric over his head when the laundry needs airing. Pipsqueak and Seers dig a small pond near the hideout and fill it with cool water every day, so they can douse the kid when his fever gets too high. (It’s always too high. Jet knows he’s a Bender.)

The day comes when the kid is drenched in sweat and clear-eyed for the first time. Longshot hums all morning — it’s the archer’s equivalent of spinning cartwheels. Jet discreetly waits until they have the kid sitting up and choking on watered-down jook before he asks his name.

The kid opens his mouth once and then drops the bowl, tears of pain streaming down his face as he grips his bandaged neck. Longshot’s joy vanishes and he assaults Jet with silent threats of grievous injury before coaxing the kid to lie down until he can pour more honey down his throat.

The problem doesn’t fix itself.

Livid, ugly scars fold into the kid's neck, and it's obvious that swallowing is painful. The midwife can't fix it. This is something for an advanced physician and they won't find one outside of a Fire Nation outpost. The Freedom Fighters have to make do, which means that bee swarms are part of Jet's daily routine and he's tired of smelling stewed goldenseal. It's the difference between the kid cringing or _crying_ when he has to eat, though, so Jet puts up with it and smears a bit of honey on the stings. 

He wonders if it's worth it to help the kid survive. No one ought to live like this.

He remembers on occasion that he should be checking for sparks. The thought is dashed when the kid nearly strangles on his own hot breath. There are flames stoking within (Jet is sure of it), but this is one Bender who will never breathe fire again.

He scowls in pity and gives Longshot a satchel full of smelly herbs for his tea remedy.

Jet doesn't realize the No-Longer-a-Firebender is finally toddling around on his own until Longshot integrates a new whistle into their code. He looks up one day on patrol and nearly falls out of a tree when Not-a-Bender slinks up the archer's birch like he has every intention of learning how to shoot arrows at nasty Firebenders.

This is definitely not safe.

Because it wasn't supposed to be permanent, and dang it, Jet hasn't even given the kid a _name_ let alone taught him how to avoid getting a douse of fire to the face.

He slides out of his tree and snaps his fingers for the newbie to come down. (Aaaand they're using nonverbal communication for the mute kid. Longshot must be internally warbling for joy.)

They gather around to discuss the matter, because names are important. The kid frowns and scratches something in the dust (Jet sees a character that could mean either failure or beloved, and what kind of parents give their kid that kind of consternation?) but Longshot wipes it out before he can finish. Unanimity established: the kid's name is not going to be Fire Nation. They don't deserve him.

"Li," Jet votes.

"Twiglegs," Smellerbee suggests.

"Goldie?" Pipsqueak pitches.

"Can we not be so obvious," Sneers grumbles. "How about Rabaroo?"

"We swore off animal names," Smellerbee reminds him. "We could call him Kemurikage: that's an alias with power."

"Shouldn't we let him pick his own name?" Pipsqueak advises.

"Sheng," Longshot says crisply.

Jet gives the archer a calculated look, because he knows his kids. He himself might believe in proper names for little baby Firebenders, but when Longshot selected his own name, he chose it for what it meant. And Sheng is a word. 

_Life_ , the archer is speaking over the kid.

Shēngcún: to survive. Shēnghuó: to dwell and enjoy living.

Jet nods. "I approve."

"That's a proper name," Smellerbee complains. "We can't single him out like that."

"I don't know, Smellerbee... I've never met anybody named Sheng," Pipsqueak hedges. 

"There's nothing wrong with Fireweed, he looks like a Bender," Sneers grumbles.

Four cross glowers shoot his way and the huddle silences.

"Li it is," Jet announces.

_"What?"_

"You said we would agree on this!" 

"Who calls their kid _Li?"_

"And we were supposed to be avoiding proper names...."

"I've changed my mind — I like Sheng better."

"Why don't we just call him Vaatu and sic' him on the Fire Nation?"

Jet stands up and brushes off his trousers, smirking when Longshot rolls his eyes. "Since you four can't agree on anything, I'm taking charge. Li is officially one of our Freedom Fighters."

Smellerbee groans. "That is the stupidest name we've ever picked."

"And yours isn't weird?" Pipsqueak ventures.

"I was six! You try changing your name after five years!"

Jet smirks and leaves Longshot to gather his new charge, already calculating what it'll take to familiarize the kid with flying projectiles and blasting jelly. It'll take some work — Li isn't good for anything but raising morale right now — but if they can just teach him to walk a little more quietly he'll be an excellent infiltrator. 

He's too preoccupied to realize the catastrophe of leaving a mute kid in Longshot's capable hands. Like how the two of them will create their own _language_ and teach their teammates only the basic fundamentals so they can gossip while Jet is **_standing_ _right there_**. Which also means that Longshot and Li will be an inseparable team since somebody will have to translate for the kid so he isn't writing everything down. And eventually that will mean that everybody learns the silent code so they can talk to Li, after which the duo will create a _second_ language so they can still keep their little secrets! (What do they have to talk about? They are literally living in a forest!)

And that's not counting the crazy Airbender that gets spastic every time the Freedom Fighters drop into code during his conversation, or the Firebending Uncle who tries to abscond with Li before Smellerbee whaps him over the crown with a skillet, or the creepy Dai Li that lull Li into thinking he's a Firebending prince with an agenda until he nearly kills himself under the delusion that he can breathe flame like a dragon, but that's a consternation that's too far ahead and Jet is pleasantly unaware that his future is about to change irrevocably for the insane.

For now, he leaves the new Freedom Fighter with Longshot.

That seems like a safe plan.


	17. Quiescent (Fire Lily AU/Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Longshot will be happy to blow up the Gaipan dam. But first his sunflower needs an energy recharge. (Jet gets twitchy, Aang is fascinated by Fire Lilies, the Freedom Fighters declare nap hour, and Li drives their fearless leader to madness.)
> 
> Another AU of an AU for photosynthetic/Freedom Fighter/Zuko

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: Tooth-rotting FLUFF. No actual whump this time....

Katara doesn’t know why her brother can’t just ease up and trust somebody for once. The Freedom Fighters rescued them from the Fire Nation — and they did it without killing anybody! If that isn’t enough to prove the nobility of their cause, then nothing will convince Sokka these kids are good at heart.

(Not that they’re kids.... not Jet. Or Pipsqueak, of course. The rest of them just look younger. Maybe it’s the way Smellerbee sneaks all of Jet’s vegetables onto Li’s plate, or Longshot starts yawning like he’s used to an early shuteye, or Li conks out in the middle of Jet’s speech and Longshot simply pulls him down to rest in his lap.)

Jet stops talking and his eyebrow gets a little spastic. “I thought I told you two to take a sun hour this afternoon.”

“Clouds,” Longshot says in a bored tone.

“Honestly, Jet. You try sunning in a cloudburst,” Smellerbee accuses.

The leader’s unflappable attitude takes a turn for the consternated. “It wasn’t raining.”

“Yes it was!” Duke declares. “A huge raindrop hit my nose!”

“And you know how Li hates to get wet, so we all came inside,” Smellerbee says.

Longshot just shrugs and pets Li’s hair into a mess of spikes.

“It was beautiful _all day_ and you know how he gets cranky,” Jet says between gritted teeth. “Why didn’t you send him up there after the ambush?”

“Li can’t sleep on his own — he’ll fall out of the tree again,” Sneers says, listing off points on his fingers like they’ve been through this before. “You asked for everyone‘s participation in setting up for tomorrow —“

“Except Li because he’ll probably blow himself up,” Smellerbee interjects.

“— So he got stuck watching the little bitty new kids all afternoon and you didn’t tell them how sunflowers work yet,” Sneers finishes. “Honestly, Jet. You never left the hideout. Why didn’t _you_ get him outside?”

“Those are the worst excuses I’ve heard all winter,” Jet says evasively, frowning in such sharp disappointment that Katara wants to jump up and demand that Aang rearrange the canopy overhead so that no one ever has to worry about light problems again.

“What’s the fuss about a few sunbeams?” Sokka points out skeptically. He looks less than thrilled that one of the Freedom Fighters is napping at the dinner table. Especially since this guy didn’t even participate in trouncing the Fire Nation camp. “We’ve had fair weather all week. So nobody went outside. Big deal.”

“Yeah, Jet,” Smellerbee says, somehow twisting Sokka’s declaration into a private argument. “It was sunny all afternoon. Why didn’t you watch Li?”

“Because I expect you to do what you’re told,” Jet snaps. His cheeks darken faintly and Pipsqueak barks with laughter.

“Or maybe someone was preoccupied with a bit of starlight,” Pipsqueak says. He waggles his eyebrows at Katara and heat floods her neck.

“We weren’t....” she gulps, thinking about that stupid hat. “I wasn’t....”

“Shhhh.” Longshot glares at each of them in turn, as if they’re disrupting his favorite child’s nap time. One glance at Li’s peaceful face and Katara doubts anything short of a forest fire could wake him.

“What’s the problem?” Aang wonders. “I mean, so he fell asleep. I’m kinda tired myself after today.”

“If you just took him outside earlier, he wouldn’t need a nap,” Jet scolds Longshot. “Now he’s going to wake up early, and he’ll get bored and start chasing sunbeams all the way to the dam, where he’ll probably set the whole thing off and drown himself. Is it that difficult to look after one sun fighter?”

“Sunflower,” Longshot says innocently.

“My fighters are not peonies,” Jet says acidly. “Li has a routine and if you lot can’t honor —“

“Wait, he’s a sun- _flower_?” Sokka states, looking like he’s just waiting to learn how bad things are before he bursts into hysterics.

Jet grinds his teeth.

“You mean... he needs sunlight to survive,” Aang analyzes cautiously. “But more than normal Firebenders.” His countenance lights up and he announces, “Li is a Fire Lily! Where did you find him? They’re supposed to be super rare — they make the best Firebenders!”

Sokka loses it. Smellerbee and Pipsqueak exchange an uncomfortable glance, while Longshot smiles and pats Li’s messy hair.

Jet looks like he might just resort to seppuku and spare himself the humiliation.


	18. Retrogression (Dragonwing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aang finds a dragon. Well, it's not exactly a real dragon. More like a teenager with claws and horns and a penchant for crunching sparrowkeets. But his wings are tangled, and it's never fair to leave an animal in a trap. (DragonWing!Zuko fic)
> 
> Set sometime just before they meet Toph. (Mostly because I wrote the whole thing with Freedom!Fighter mentality and forgot that by the time Zuko sports any decent hair Toph ought to be splatting upside-down Appa posters on the walls. Oops.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: Violence to Dragons. Also I may have accidentally made the Gaang evil (through good-willed intentions!)
> 
> Basic background: Draiks are a rare line of Firebenders with wings and scales and a penchant for catlike tendencies. (Picture humans with wings, horns, clawed feet and hands, and a spattering of scales.) They can transfer between fully human and draik form, but if their wings are injured they cannot transform back to humans until they are fully recovered. While in draik form, they have the brain of a very shrewd three-year-old and can comprehend (but not speak) basic language patterns. Complex memories fuzz while in draik form, but returning to human form fully restores all memories including time spent in draik form. 
> 
> Because I needed a Zuko with broken wings.

It's the screeching that draws them to the island. It's barely mid-day and Appa could fly for hours yet, but something sounds _hurt_ and Aang can't just leave it to struggle on its own.

"Remember the shirshu monster?" Sokka warns him, reluctantly sliding down to stand beside Katara because nobody else is going to be sensible enough to fly on like they didn't hear anything. "That's what it sounds like. Think paralytic and Appa-Killer. Whatever it is, it probably wants to be left alone."

"I've heard this before, I know it!" Aang insists, hopping on one foot as he shakes a thorny vine from the other. "I can't remember where, but I know it's in trouble."

"Meaning it _is_ trouble," Sokka argues. "Didn't anyone ever warn you about wounded animals?"

"Sokka's right; if it feels threatened, it'll lash out," Katara agrees. "Maybe we should search from the air."

"Or just leave it alone," Sokka stresses. "It's probably a tigerdillo eating its lunch. I'd be cranky too, if someone tried to steal my food from me."

"I can't believe you want to just leave it here," Aang grumbles, shoving through the bramble without heed for the thorns scratching his arms. "That isn't a food cry. It's hurting, and it knows its in trouble. That means it's intelligent. We can't just leave it there to get eaten by something else!"

"Or, we could intelligently _not_ get involved," Sokka suggests. He slumps in defeat, because Aang is already far ahead and this is just going to be one more disaster with murderous giant rabbits and sneering pirates. Why can't they have a quiet, peaceful stroll through the market for once?

The devastation is visible far from the source. Scorched grass and blackened vines, a swathe of boulders scorched black. A few trees have been reduced to charcoal, and that's when Aang's heart springs. Dragon!

"I knew they weren't extinct!" he yips, running easily across the flattened underbrush. Straight into a swathe of flame. "Yipe!" 

"Aang!" Katara calls far behind him. "Aang, wait up!"

There's no time to let the others catch up. The dragon obviously struggled long enough to burn a good portion of the forest, and they're just lucky they've had a wet spell or the dragon might have cooked itself by accident. Aang's not waiting any longer.

Another howl splits the air, rippling like a roar mixed with a scream, and suddenly Aang knows _exactly_ what this is. (But the last draik he knows of was accused of going feral, and the Fire Nation locked it away until its fires grew cold. That was over a hundred years ago. How could Ozai let this one survive?)

Aang finally spots a wing flapping madly against the freshly ashed clearing, and he skids to a halt. Because that's a _gold_ wing, and he's never heard of a draik with scales brighter than pale orange or bronze. A patch of red obscures the upturned face, and suddenly everything makes sense. 

"Zuko!" 

Gold eyes are enlarge to golden pupils, maddened with torment. There's blood on clawed fingers and flaps of stained silk hanging where wings and claws tore it away, revealing lines of golden scales blending with skin that ripples as the prince breathes, like a coiled serpent bracing to strike. Sharpened tail fins flap uselessly against the barbed trap that entangles a crumpled left wing and pale, blood-painted limbs. Claws have punctured pointed-toe boots, but the leather is now constricting powerful feet capable of scaling horizontal cliffs. Normal draiks wouldn't dare transform in the impediments of full armor. Zuko must've been scared into a transformation, only to find the trap stronger than his own claws. 

The man standing behind an iron shield seems to think it's funny.

"Fascinating how they just come out like that," he comments to Aang. He's taller than King Bumi, with black hair knotted into a severe braid and narrow eyes, dressed in drab brown and a green vest like he's trying to blend in with the forest. There's an odd machine in his hand, like a crossbow coiled with spiked wire, and he looks ready to shoot off another round. Aang clenches his fists.

"I heard the Dragon of the West passed his blood on to an unfortunate relative," the man says. "Of course, there's always a risk, bolting a human. They don't tend to survive the shock. But, iron tends to bring out the worst in creatures, and a little fireweed nectar forces the transformation. Once I clip this draik's wings off he'll stay this way. Someone will pay a fair price to show off a gold one."

Zuko might have horns branching from his scalp like an over-sized messenger hawk, but his face is fully human and he looks _terrified_. Aang lunges forward as the trigger snaps and lashes out, billowing the second snare into a charcoaled pine. "Leave him alone!"

"Hey!" the man yelps. "That's my draik, Kid! I've been tracking his ship for two months and if you think I'm walking away without a pure gold fire breather —"

"You're not taking him anywhere!" Aang shouts. He flings his arms apart, hands braced like claws, and thinks, ' _It's not nearly enough!'_ when the man slams into a coal-streaked boulder. Another gust and bone strikes rock and the man falls still. Aang is about to slash out again when there's a _wail_ and he whips around, yelping when he sees Zuko batting feebly from where he's landed against a tree. Golden claws and pale, scarlet-beaded skin and wide, frightened eyes. He's scared of Aang.

This is not how they were supposed to meet up again!

"No, no — it's okay. I'm not gonna hurt you," Aang soothes, dropping his hands immediately. Zuko snarls and beats his tail, managing to flip himself off of his damaged wing, only to get the other one tangled under his enormous feet. It's laughable and sad. 

"Aang!" Katara hollers, finally catching up. She huffs when she sees him, bracing her hands on her thighs to catch her breath. "You should wait for us, Aang. What if —"

A startled _Eep!_ is the only sound she can make. 

Zuko's scales ripple to muted orange and he huddles in like he's trying to cover the rips in his trousers. Huh. Maybe draiks are self-conscious.

"Katara, it's Zuko," Aang tells her softly. "Someone's trying to cage him."

More like ensnare him and cut off his wings so he'll be stuck in a half-human state forever, caged and mocked and confused because draiks don't reason like humans and he won't understand why he can't just transform again and hide himself in a fleshy, harmless state. Forever aware of friend versus foe, kindness and cruelty, and bars and iron chains holding him back from the sky. Zuko might be the enemy, but Aang can't let that happen to him.

"We have to let him out."

"But it's _Zuko_ ," Katara says weakly, looking like she's trying to comprehend a scaled beast with inky hair and wings that probably extend to twice the length of his lanky body. Zuko hisses at her, eyeing her hands and retreating in a shuffling crawl. 

"Katara, draiks don't think like we do," Aang tells her, holding out his hand palm-down to show he's not going to Airbend. "He's too weak to hunt us. Besides, draiks only know loyalty and survival. He doesn't have a mission to finish." Softly Aang adds, "I don't think he'd even _want_ to go home."

Because there's still a scar marring flesh, and the only way a dragon can be burned, even in human form, is if someone holds it under a brand. There's only one nation that can produce that level of flame.

"He will when he changes back," Katara says. 

"Draiks can't change while their wings are injured," Aang tells her. "Drawing the injury inside doesn't erase it." He slides forward another step, letting Zuko catch his scent. Golden wings spasm as the prince stumbles further back. He probably remembers they've fought, even if he doesn't recognize Aang. "I'm not going to hurt you. I promise."

"Can we _not_ run into dangerous forests filled with dead animals?" Sokka calls shakily from behind them. He steps around a crisped hoppy possum and claps a hand to his mouth, gagging. 

Aang cringes, seeing more dead animals and birds scattered through the ruined forest. "I don't think he meant to kill them." He hopes Zuko didn't. Because if the Fire Lord's son is feral, they'll have to put him down. A feral draik is nothing more than a firestorm waiting to light the world.

"Wait, that's a ...." Sokka's jaw drops and he stammers, "It's a dra.... a drag...."

"It's my prize!" the man in green growls, gritting his teeth as he braces his bleeding head. "Now you kids step back, while I finish this killer beast off."

"He's not a prize!" Aang yells. "He has a name and a family! I'm not letting you put him in a cage!"

"It's a cold-blooded reptile with human hide," the man retorts. "It can't talk, it can't reason, and it'll bite your head off if you get too close! Now stand back before I put you in a trap!"

"Aang!" Katara shouts, slashing one arm out just as a knife flashes in the man's hand. Water whips the blade away and then slaps the man back against the rock. He doesn't get up this time.

Dragon Zuko wants to be sure. Aang barely gets his hands out in time to redirect a cascade of fire away from the hunter. Zuko snorts, gnashing at him for sparing his tormentor, and Sokka looks like he just saw his father wearing a Kiyoshi uniform. 

"That scar — it looks like —"

"Zuko," Katara confirms darkly. She swirls a water globe in her hands, surmising the distance and velocity needed to shut down another fire torrent. 

"Katara, stop!" Aang protests, darting in front of her. "Can't you see he's scared? Of course he's breathing fire! Don't make him think you're the enemy!"

"He _is_ the enemy, Aang," Sokka says. "Chasing us halfway across the globe? Kidnapping you at the North Pole? This is the perfect opportunity for him to capture you."

"No, you don't get it!" Aang insists. "Draiks don't act on orders. They fight to protect their clanmates, but they don't understand sides. They're not like real dragons, okay? If we help him we can prove that we're better clanmates than the Fire Nation. Just think what it would mean if Zuko changed sides!"

"That is a very improbable theory," Sokka deadpans.

"But he could be my Firebending teacher!" Aang says. "Just think of it — I'd practically have a real dragon for a teacher. I'll bet Zuko knows a lot more by instinct than he could ever learn from the Fire Nation."

"Aang, that's assuming he would _want_ to teach you," Katara says. "Didn't you say yourself that it's wrong to trap a draik in his dragon form?"

"Look, if we help him now, then we can talk to him once he changes back," Aang proposes. "It'll take weeks for his wings to heal naturally. That's long enough to form a bond. Once he's better, Zuko can decide for himself."

"It sounds like you're suggesting that Katara _not_ heal him," Sokka says dubiously. "That sounds kind of manipulative to me."

"Do you want to be fighting the Fire Lord alone, or with the help of a dragon?" Aang says. "I need to learn Firebending, Sokka. This may be the only way."

Sokka looks uneasily from the draik that is still clawing at the wire encasing it, to the Airbender who is fairly jittery with hope. "I still think there's something wrong with this picture, but... if it means defeating the Fire Lord, I guess we can try it."

He has a bad feeling he's going to regret humoring Aang.

* * *

It's cruel to leave the draik's wings unattended, Katara thinks, but Aang is right — the moment Zuko heals, he'll transform back to himself and run away. At least this way they can try to reason with him. (Is it the same when they're trying to prove themselves by being nice, instead of talking to a normal person? Aren't they technically holding Zuko hostage until he can revert to his human self?)

She keeps an eye on the welts, using subtle water healing for muscle damage and tendon splices, just to make sure there's no permanent injury. Aang is queasy about leaving Zuko with more scars, so she prioritizes turning whitened scales back to gold. At least there are no marks on the _outside_ to prove the damage within.

It feels wrong. Zuko lashes out at first, hugging his injured wing like he expects Katara to lop it off with an ice shear, but then he looks after her uncertainly when she heals it only part of the way. It's like he knows she's a Master Bender, and he doesn't understand why she's leaving him bound to the earth. She spends most of the night with her back to him as he spins in circles, trying to find a comfortable position. She could fix it.

She promised she wouldn't.

She pretends she's asleep when Zuko flops his good wing in frustration as midnight turns into dawn. He doesn't sleep any better in Appa's saddle when they continue travelling the next day.

* * *

Real dragons have fully-plated scales to cover their nakedness. Draiks have an extensive measure of self-awareness, which means that Zuko hogs all the furs and tunnels into them, as if showing the least bit of pink skin is a dishonor comparable to losing the Avatar. Katara finally wrestles a blanket away and uses Sokka as a size comparison to sew a makeshift parka and trousers. She holds them out uncertainly, squeaks when a clawed hand snatches for the covering, and then waits for an hour until Aang suggests she step behind a tree so that Zuko can change in privacy. (It works. Sokka makes "Blue-Ko" quips for the rest of the day, while Katara tries to fathom the concept of, " _The Avatar's pet dragon is wearing fuzzy blanket pajamas._ ")

They stop building a fire at night, as well. Firebenders have warmer temperatures, Aang muses, but draiks are literal hearths draped in scales and Katara _so_ wants to tuck right against that glorious warmth. She is not part of Zuko's "clan," though ( _the very idea!_ ), so she maintains a respectful distance and the dragon part of Zuko doesn't threaten to eat her. (Sokka has no such reservations, and is gracelessly whacked out of the circle by a golden tail when he tries encroaching on Zuko's personal space.)

Appa is the only one who seems to be Zuko's personal "buddy." When the draik first nips at the sky bison's heels Katara is terrified, but once Appa whacks Zuko head-over-heels and the draik comes bounding up for a second go she realizes they're just playing. In fact, Zuko spends most of his lazy afternoons half-buried the bison's fur, kneading his claws lazily as he spreads his wings in the sun.

(Momo is not invited into the draik's games. He spends most of the their travels cowering in Aang's poncho, leery after he was mistaken for a furry appetizer.) 

* * *

Aang's excitement is tainted with guilt. Having a draik for a teacher will be amazing, but they have to earn Zuko's trust first. And to do that, they have to keep him pinned. Just for a little while.

It's like tethering Appa in a deep dark hole. The dragon in Zuko doesn't understand why he's a threat, he just knows that his wing hurts and he can't lick the sting because it's not there (not visibly), and Aang could ask Katara to fix it at any time but he can't — not until Zuko is comfortable enough around them that instinct will overwhelm logic when he's back to analyzing like a human again. That's how the Firebenders used to tame feral draiks, and it's a lot kinder than actually putting a chain through his wing or starving him until he associates human generosity with a clan bond. 

It still feels wrong.

"Draiks eat a lot more than polarbear dogs," Sokka comments, when Zuko digs his eighth crab out of the sandbank and starts prowling while there's still a leg dangling from his mouth. "Do you think he could bring down larger animals? Like a fox antelope?"

"I wouldn't try it yet," Aang says softly. He looks away when Zuko prods at his right leg and shakes it, like he's trying to figure out what's wrong with it when there aren't any marks besides faded pink lines. "I don't think he can hold down with any large animals right now."

He's wrong.

* * *

Apparently Zuko likes to chew shoes. First the leather scraps that Sokka sawed off his giant clawed feet. Then the nice sealskin boots he leaves to dry by the fire. Sokka draws the line when the draik starts gnawing on Appa's saddle.

"Aang, we need to do something about your dragon's habits!"

"Maybe he's teething?" Aang speculates, scratching his head. "I don't think all of his adult teeth have grown in yet."

Zuko growls when Sokka shoves him away from the saddle rim, baring nasty rows of needle-like fangs. "Well, start thinking creatively," Sokka warns, "Because Sharp-Tooth here is going to savage the bedrolls next."

He makes a few suggestions, which Aang dismisses immediately. Tree branches will cause splinters, rocks might break Zuko's teeth, and finding more leather won't fix the problem because it's not sturdy enough to stand five minutes under teeth that can crunch birds in one snap. (Which is just... ewww. The third chomped sparrowkeet makes Sokka vow to give Zuko every fish he catches from now on, because a draik sneezing on feathers is just deadly.) 

Zuko finds his own compromise when he pounces into the water one morning and has to be dragged back on a wave by Katara, because he won't let go of the porpoise that's beating him over the head. Whale blubber is nice and the meat is amazing, but Sokka swears Zuko is deliberately snickering as he glances at the defenseless nonbender and chomps very hard on his nice, fresh bone.

The Avatar is a naive idiot. Anyone can tell Zuko is just waiting to bring him to the Fire Nation for a family barbecue.

* * *

The first time Zuko tries flying again, he falls hard and spends the rest of the day limping. He won't let Katara near him. There's a terrifying moment when she screams and the boys scramble to find her, only to see Zuko spinning around madly until he pins the wing that's bothering him, chomping down hard enough to draw blood. It seems as if he needs to see a reason for his troubles, because he calms down afterwards and lets Katara fix his leg. He tosses her before she can attend to the bite mark and slinks away, licking the puncture marks until they stop seeping. 

"Aang, this is wrong," Katara says. 

"I know," Aang admits. "We just... I can't lose him yet. We're so _close_."

* * *

Sokka may not be a bending mastermind, but he does know how to scratch Appa behind the ears. He just about has the sky bison rolling over (and it occurs to him that if the sky bison ever had ear ticks it would be so _gross_ ) when a horned head jabs into his personal space and Zuko casually flings out a scaled hand and shoves him off. 

It happens again the next time. 

And again, until Sokka starts to wonder if there's more to it than the dragon contesting for his personal cuddly rug. He does the weirdest thing in his life and scratches the area around Zuko's horns, and the dragon just drops with the sleepiest, most blissful expression.

Huh.

* * *

It's not fair when Zuko brings in his first shared catch and gives it to Sokka. He's supposed to be Aang's Firebending teacher. At least he should bond with Katara first, since he would associate her with easing physical pain. 

Sokka doesn't seem to share that sentiment, because his face spasms apprehensively when the spotted fish is dropped at his feet. "Uh, no thanks. Seriously, you eat it."

"Sokka, you have to accept!" Aang hisses. "Clan feeding is a crucial part of the bond!" Not to mention Sokka had been sharing his fish with Zuko for days now, and to reject Zuko's first contribution would be like snubbing his nest brother.

"Aang, I can't eat this," Sokka says queasily. "Seriously, I can't."

Katara takes a closer look and claps her hands over her face, looking like she's not sure whether to laugh or scream. "That's a trunkfish," she whispers. "Maybe they're not poisonous to dragons?"

Snickering in that creepy, throaty rasp, Zuko nudges the fish closer and bops Sokka's knee with his head. Those golden eyes are pure mischief.

"Thanks, but I think I'll choose life," Sokka begs. "I'm human. We can't eat stuff like that."

Almost like he knew it, Zuko snaps up the fish delicately and swallows it whole, slurping his lips as if to prove _he's_ not a flimsy, pathetic human. He snatches out faster than anyone can track and swipes Sokka's broiled catfish as well. 

"Okay, maybe stealing food is a good sign?" Aang speculates as bone and flesh is quickly consumed. 

"Hey! Get your own stupid fish!"

Sokka ends the day with a few new scratches on his arms. Zuko looks far too pleased with himself.

* * *

Katara can track Zuko's internal healing by the puncture marks on his wing. They take longer to seal than they should. Maybe he's missing something in his diet (Sokka can't land enough fish for three people and a dragon), or maybe draiks just take longer to heal. It doesn't help that Zuko flaps around every morning, testing his wings to see if they'll bear his weight for more than a minute. 

"If he keeps this up he'll permanently damage himself," she ponders one morning, when Zuko is prowling and lashing out at innocent trees. (It's a good thing he's friends with Appa — it takes him less than five minutes to shred a sturdy oak. He tears one of his claws and belches fire in retaliation, smoking the tree into charcoal lumps. Sokka sacrifices his own fish to make sure they don't wake up to another cranky episode.)

"I think we're finally getting through to him," Aang says, but his voice is wavering. Katara understands. Zuko is fun as a dragon, but he's as much a prisoner here as Aang was on the Fire Nation ship. They don't need chains and iron bars to be cruel. Sooner or later, the human side of Zuko will return, and he won't thank them for coaxing him along with the bare minimum of healing and a place by their fire. 

"This isn't right," Katara repeats, shaking her head.

* * *

Eventually, Zuko forces their hand. He jumps from Appa's saddle and tries gliding on his own. (Or maybe he's just hungry and desperate, because he aims for an eagle hawk and misses by a yard). Aang tries to catch him, but draik is slippery and too panicked as he flings out wings that haven't born his weight in weeks. 

Katara screams when the shine of gold hits sand. 

His good wing is broken, snapped beneath him in bloody juts of bone, and his head is bleeding. He looks up at them in a daze, shying away from Aang before instinct takes over and he leans forward, resting his head in the Airbender's hands.

_This is it,_ Katara realizes. _This is the moment when he's finally started to trust us._

Tears slide down Aang's face. "I can't do it," he chokes. "We have to let him go." Pleading eyes latch onto Katara as Aang eases the draik off of his crumpled wing. "Please, Katara! He needs to be able to fly again."

Pain wells in her throat and Katara realizes she's crying, too. Because this isn't Zuko, the ruthless hunter who chased Aang from the South Pole to the Earth Kingdom. This is their dragon, spunk and smirk and sad eyes, who trusted them because they untangled him from a trap and fed him and gave him a safe place to sleep. He trusted them, and they hurt him just the same as if they'd cut off his wings.

She brings water to her hands and the draik yelps, tucking his head into Aang's arms as salt burns the open wounds. Sokka gently holds him down, rubbing his horns until the surface injuries close and Katara can focus on the damage within. She knits tendon and bone, strengthening weakened flight muscles and easing the knots she didn't even realize would spur with inactivity. Slowly Zuko's trembles ease. When Katara nudges him, he rolls over without a fuss, stretching his wing with a sigh of relief.

She dreads the feel of his bad wing, because she knows she put it off too long. Despite her efforts to control the damage, scar tissue is ridged into the webbing. It breaks down slowly and Zuko whimpers, clawing the sand and leaning desperately into Sokka's scratching to distract himself from the sensation. Katara doesn't know if the healing itches or burns; she only knows the draik wants it _over_.

And then it is. 

Raising his head sharply, Zuko sniffs at his wings, flapping them in cautious trepidation. Katara knows they shouldn't hurt. She may not be able to fix the scar on his face, but there's no reason he shouldn't fly again.

He doesn't try. 

Slinking away from the three, Zuko tucks himself into Appa's paws and curls his tail up to his nose, hiding under wings of delicate gold. 

He doesn't peek out when evening falls.

Katara cries in her brother's arms that night, wishing she could go back to the first day when they rescued a draik from a hunter's trap.

Zuko knows they kept him pinned.

* * *

The next day he's gone. 

They're not far from Fire Nation waters. Maybe he found his uncle. Maybe Azula isn't actively hunting dragon-winged Firebenders. Or maybe Zuko's just out for an early morning hunt and he'll be back with a stupid whale and a bruised noggin and that creepy smile he displays whenever he attacks something bigger than himself. 

They don't want to think about him lying somewhere, caught in another trap, or clawing at the walls of an iron ship. Wings sheared off, because that's what people _do_ to draiks.

Time passes. Katara learns bloodbending. They meet a little blind girl who bullies Aang into fighting with rocks. Sokka gets himself a fancy space sword.

They don't think they'll ever see Zuko again. Not until he's standing in the Western Air Temple, golden eyes uncertain and pointed shoes subtly slit at the back, like he's hoping he can ditch them at any moment and just be a dragon again.

It's not supposed to end okay for anyone. But somehow it does. Because the Fire Nation has more forgiveness than they were willing to imagine. Katara speculates late one night, when there's a draik warming the room and an Earthbender fearlessly curled against him, that maybe they had it all wrong. Zuko was never feral. His time spent as a draik only showed the goodness that was always in his heart.

Maybe, just maybe, he'll become the Fire Lord who brings the nations together again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obviously Toph would be Draik!Zuko's best buddy, which makes me wish I had remembered to fit her in. (At the same time, she never would've put up with trapping him in the first place, so this is better set before the Gaang had mature consciences.)


	19. Sardonian (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She's the only one Zuko remembers without fear. He'd rather spend the rest of his life in uncertainty than be turned away again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: Alluded Deaths (no main characters)

When the Avatar Spirit pummels the outpost, Katara can't stop it. Archways dissolve and passages split. Walls shiver apart. The Avatar rises above a courtyard strewn with crumpled soldiers and General Fong has the gall to flatter him. 

"Together we will obliterate the Fire Nation!" the general goads, heedless of the soldier groaning at his feet. "Help us, Avatar, and we will scatter them like rats in the ruins of their capital!"

"Where is Li?" the voices of the past demand.

General Fong hesitates and forces a wider smile. "We have already achieved partial victory through the Fire Nation's own prince! Or were you not aware that your friend is a traitor?"

Katara can't stop Aang.

He has to be carried to Appa's saddle afterwards. Sokka takes the reins while Katara holds a child together, stroking his head while he quivers.

"I'll never use the Avatar State again," Aang whispers, before he hides his face and clams up for good.

There are too many bodies left behind, and Li is nowhere to be found.

* * *

It's a Fire Nation ship, all right. All cold, sharp edges and efficient, perfect use of space and banners like fresh blood dripping off every wall. It's like a dragon's tomb; a sanctuary for oppressors. Azula lands her sandalled feet on chilly metal and her instinct screams that it's right, but the years spent in a city crammed with filth have made her soft. There are no voices shouting through thin walls, or bath water splashing down from the upstairs balcony, or rice glop bubbling with spices and fruit, or a cozy stove warming the floor in the one tiny room that she and Mother call their own. There's enough space in this... this cavern of steel that they could house the entire village outside General Fong's outpost. Perhaps the whole of Omashu.

(She'll get to Omashu. One day. When she's bored and Mother turns her back for just a moment and the mountains don't seem quite so high.)

For now, there's a door standing in her way.

Gathering the irritation that started building up this morning when that stupid toddler with croup wailed, Azula spins sharply and slams a right kick at the door. It dents, and defies her.

Fine. Steel instead of wood. She can adapt.

Five strikes. Five new scorch marks, and finally the troublesome thing falls off its hinges. Sweeping her hair over her shoulder ( _ugh_ , when did it fall out of its braid, and she left her brush at home), Azula tucks her hands behind her back and slinks. This might be the Fire Nation's ship, but she's the Face Stealer, and those who try to detain her here will... remain unidentified for eternity.

"I hope you're planning to dress properly before you escape."

Spinning on her toes, Azula gathers lightning in each fist, tossing her hair out of her face. ( _Why_ is it always in the way? One of these days she'll defy Mother and hack it to stubs — then let the babbling old women boast about their precious jade combs from times gone by!) Her fluttery, modest skirt is tucked under her sleeping mat, and there's nothing improper about a sensible pair of boy's trousers. Perhaps the seams are a little tight, but Azula is no fool; loose fabric makes more noise.

The old general from the dock regards her pitilessly, rigid lines accented harshly in Fire Nation red and black. This is her sentinel; her prosecutor; her executor if need be. She should be more cautious, but where's the fun in that?

"Oh, you saved me," Azula mocks, dramatizing a damsel's swoon. "If not for your patrol the Blue Spirit would certainly have snatched me away!"

"There is no need for theatrics, Azula."

She doesn't catch herself in time. Even Mother doesn't call her that any more, except when she starts blathering on about honor and remembering a life that she herself abandoned. Hastily covering the uncertain pause, Azula drawls, "It's Akemi, General...." She pauses, inviting him to share his own unmemorable title.

"I know who you are, Azula," the old man says. "Even if you have forgotten me."

Laughing uneasily, Azula tucks her left foot behind the opposite heel, feeling for the thin knife tucked into her sandal. Ah, so the fools _have_ forgotten to search her. "I doubt I would forget one so venerable and wise, my good sir."

The sour pentapus doesn't rise to the compliment. Well, Mother can't say she doesn't try to cooperate with the authorities. Azula smiles between her teeth and glances down the hall, noting a clean exit. 

Where are all the guards?

"You may not remember, Azula," the old man prods again, "But you and your brother were once well acquainted with my son, Lu Ten. I am your uncle, Azula."

She might have believed him. Add a few stones to the waistline and a hideous doll from the most recently conquered village, and he might resemble the ridiculous coot who led Grandfather's armies to Ba Sing Se. 

Then the old man makes his fatal mistake. "Zuko remembers me."

In that moment Azula stops listening. It's as easy as tuning out one of Mother's lectures and so much more necessary, because everything this man wishes to convey is a lie.

Zuko died in the spring, five years past. 

Nothing since that day has made any sense.

* * *

It’s been weeks since Zuko had real Earth Kingdom food. The last thing he remembers eating _period_ was a handful of salty, dry crisps that tasted like fish oil and seaweed. Jook might be bland (especially since Jet is the only one who can make it without burning it and sometimes they have to just gulp down whatever Sneers manages to turn out), but it’s hot and homey and familiar and Zuko catches himself jittering as the woman in the mask hands out bowls with achingly slow gracefulness. She takes a moment to familiarize with each tenant, as if reassuring them with her soft voice will ease their minds about the pale mask. Why is this taking so long?

Longshot entertains himself by slicing a piece of soft hide from Zuko’s boot and running his fingers down it. He’s probably never seen a turtle seal before. “Blue?” he asks curiously, looking at Zuko's clothes.

“Uh.... Water Tribe,” Zuko says. “It’s a long story.” He wants to talk about Yue, but he’s not sure how to put it. That he might leave again, this time for good. (But he’s going to be Fire Lord one day, unless they can’t defeat Azulon, and in that case nothing will matter because even the North Pole won’t be safe for her.)

“Not bear,” Longshot says critically, looking more consternated about a scrap of fur than Jet twitching over Smellerbee’s flower arrangement on the community table. 

“It’s turtle seal,” Zuko explains. “They’re seals. With turtle shells.”

Longshot sighs and pats his shoulder. _Yes, very well explained. Now what is a seal?_

Zuko is just pantomiming a pair of flippers when the woman in the white mask reaches them. He trails off mid- _arff_ and freezes with his arms awkwardly crooked, grateful that the woman is wearing a mask over her expression and hoping she won’t mind if he just sinks into the wall. Longshot snickers.

"You must be strangers," the woman says, stirring the jook to dispel any filming. 

Longshot shrugs.   
  


Tucking his arms down quickly, Zuko blusters, "Uh, yeah! I'm ... Li— _ang!_ Liang! And this is... Aoi? My brother."

The woman drops her ladle. Droplets of jook spatter and Zuko flinches as the porridge tacks his face. He raises a hand to wipe it away and the woman moves, setting down the pot and seizing his wrists with work-hardened fingers. Longshot shoves in, putting his own face in the line of fire while an arrow lashes to his bow, but the woman only gasps a name.

"Zuko? My little Zuko?

Her hands shake, but Zuko realizes it's his own arms trembling, shivers wracking his shoulders as he shakes his head. "I — I don't.... Who are you?"

The woman releases one of his wrists and with inhumane ferocity she hauls him to his feet, leading him across the room to a small doorway where shadows branch and he somehow knows he's never coming back. Longshot leaps to catch his other hand, and for an instant there's a tug-of-war before the woman lets go, tension lacing her voice with fear.

"Zuko, trust me. Come inside now."

She knows his name. She could betray him to the soldiers who are surely patrolling just outside, or lock him somewhere where he'll never see his family again. (It's happened before. He isn't stupid.)

But the eyes behind the mask are gold. Imploring. Wet and wild and wide with fear.

Zuko trails after her. Longshot huffs and tramps alongside him, casting him a scowl that implies, _I'm getting you out of here, even though I know you're digging yourself into an underground cell. Again._

The room they're led to isn't a cellar, or a dark closet filled with cloaks and portraits of laughing, lost children and floorboards tainted in soldiers' blood. It's small, with a partition between two beds, a coal stove, and a single vanity with a chair and a broken mirror. The woman closes the door behind them and lights the lamp, and Longshot chokes.

It takes Zuko a moment to remember that normal people are supposed to use spark rocks. She doesn't.

Breathing deeply, the woman sifts her hair back from her shoulders and unties her mask. She slips it down reluctantly, but her hesitation speaks of fear. A mask can veil all; scars, birth marks, fugitives. 

Zuko stares at the smooth, soft features, faintly lined with years of dread, and he doesn't feel Longshot guide him over to the chair. There's a turtleduck pond and a childish squabble by a fountain and warm arms enfolding him but he can't go back so why is she _here?_

"Zuko?" the woman sobs, pressing her hands before her face as though beseeching the spirits. "I'm your... I'm your mother. Don't you remember me?"

He shakes his head frantically because this can't be true, she's in the palace and Father wants him dead and Mother doesn't want him anymore and Uncle said he can never go home. He rubs his scarred wrists (he can't speak to her, not like this, not when Uncle flinched at his voice, it hasn't healed since the komodo rhino dragged him) and stares at the blue fabric of his trousers, because he can't be anything more opposite to the name she's calling and he's going to disappoint her and she'll turn him away like Uncle and he _can't keep losing!_

"Zuko," Longshot says, tapping the top of Zuko's head and nodding at the woman. Because of course he knows, there were posters for a while and then they just stopped, like the Fire Nation had given up. (Why didn't they tell him they knew?)

The woman starts forward like she's going to envelope him, before she stops herself and hugs her arms to herself, silent tears cascading from tired eyes. Longshot prods and Zuko digs in his heels, because he doesn't want to know. He can bear living forever in uncertainty. If she turns on him he'll break down and run back to Gaipan and he'll try to forget the fire in his blood that makes puts hate in Jet's eyes and sorrow on Longshot's shoulders and makes war with every peaceful civilization. She's the only one he can't remember with fear and he'd rather lose himself than shatter that memory, where mothers are supposed to protect their children from harm.

Longshot braces windy hands between his shoulder blades and _shoves_. Zuko totters on his feet, shuffling back instinctively, and the woman with gold eyes stops baiting him and attacks. He cries out into her shoulder (he thought she was taller) as unfamiliar scents assault him, further corrupting the faded memories of palace gardens. She smells like coal smoke and grassy soap, chalk paint and pine and damp earth. Her arms brace him loosely, like she's not sure what to do with him, but when he wriggles her arms tighten and she cups a hand behind his head. 

"Zuko. Oh, my little Zuko."

She's not.... She _can't_ be.... What if she isn't....? 

"Why didn’t you want me?" Zuko whispers.

There's an agonized gasp and the embrace becomes unbearably tight. "Zuko, how could you think that?" In the next instant anger laces her tone. "What did Azula tell you?"

It pours out and he starts holding on, and it's a feeling of _warm_ and _secure_ and _trapped_ but he can't stop talking. "F-Father was going to... and I didn't want to believe her but she came back and she doesn't lie twice and ... and I couldn't find you, sh-she said you'd left... I didn't know what to do. I'm sorry! I want to go back but Uncle said they'll kill me...."

_"What?"_

"But I can stay here with you, can't I?" Zuko plows on, a hiccuping smile easing his dread as he realizes this isn't the Fire Nation and the same rules can't possibly apply. "I can help. I'll wear a mask like you and I won't bend and they'll never look for me here and you won't even notice if... if you don't want me I mean, I won't cause any trouble...."

"Zuko!" Horrified, Ursa draws back and cups his face, fresh tears sparking her eyes. "Zuko, I thought you were dead! Why would I send you away now?"

Shaking his head _(this has to be real, he can't bear it otherwise..._.) Zuko whispers, "U-Uncle did...."

"When?" A dragon's snare winds around that single word. For a moment his mother looks more like a Fire Sage than Ozai's bride. As if she could pull fire from the earth and incinerate an army and never flinch.

Averting his eyes, Zuko answers numbly, "Before we went to the North Pole." Weeks ago, or maybe years. He's forgetting his uncle's face again, but not the feel of comforting hands that equally sheltered him and shoved him aside.

"Did he imprison you?" Every word is poison, family against family, and Zuko wants to steal back his admission. Uncle loves him. He cares. Zuko just didn't earn his forgiveness yet. (He never will. He can't go home.)

"Zuko!" Ursa prods.

"N-No! Of course not," Zuko says, jounced back to the small, dim room with its dragon lamp and wooden floors. "He sent us on our way. He helped the Avatar."

_He didn't want me._

"The Avatar is alive?"

It all happens so fast after that. Words pour out of his mouth: the Firebending Master, the Northern Air Temple, Zhao. He doesn't tell her about the Freedom Fighters. (There's nothing there that Longshot won't tell her if he so chooses.)He doesn't mention Yue, or the spirit fish, or the hands that held him under the pond. He does tell her about the Earth Kingdom outpost and how lightning danced across the sky before he woke up in the shelter with Longshot. He tells her that Uncle protected him, that he didn't send him away alone.

Mother grabs a fading, embroidered pouch and stuffs it with bandages and soap and rice and clothing that's too small for her and a small box of bright pigment powder. She asks Longshot questions that are easy to answer with a head shake or nod. Was there a masked bender with him? Was it a child? Did the soldiers take her away?

"Fire Nation," Longshot volunteers. 

Gold eyes flash. Was there a leader at the helm? Was he stocky and grizzled? 

"General," Longshot says. "Fighter."

Mother doesn't seem to like that answer. Was the ship large? Did Longshot see it leave?

"West." 

The phrase that Mother evokes is completely Earth Kingdom and unsuitable for a cabbage merchant to overhear. "They're taking her back. Five years I've protected her from her father, and I am _not_ letting that self-absorbed lion vulture destroy whatever good is left!"

"Uncle wouldn't —"

"Uncle doesn't know Azula," Mother snaps. "He won't even try to understand."

Zuko stops listening after _Azula_. He sits down while Longshot helps pack, and doesn't argue when Mother loops a cloak over his shoulders and adjusts the hood to shadow his face. Because Azula is alive and Uncle took her but he didn't let Zuko stay, and he should probably be worried because Mother is but he can't help but feel jealous because _everyone_ wants his sister. She's talented and precise and she probably mastered Firebending already, while he can't remember the simplest katas. 

Now Uncle is taking her home. 

Mother replaces her mask and has a quick word with the man stocking the hearth, placing a small money pouch in his hands. "Li Jie will continue my work here," she murmurs to Zuko, leading the way down a narrow street. "We're going to find your sister."

She keeps a hand on his shoulder, like she's afraid he'll get lost. He ought to tell her not to worry, because Longshot always tracks him down, but he's too dazed to speak. 

Mother is here. Azula is alive. Uncle lost weight.

He wants to wake up and believe this is all a nightmare.

He doesn't want the dream to end.


	20. Tailwind (Dragonwing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The crew looks out for their miniature dragon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: None

The crew is well aware that what happens on the Golden Dragon stays on the Golden Dragon. (The crew is also aware that Iroh’s sense of humor is tempting fate and a smarter general would change the name of his ship.) They understand they are being well paid for their silence, which is why they never indicate that the extra stipend is redundant because no one is going to mention the little golden draik that drags entire squid onto the ship and chases his tail like an excited puppy kitten. (Honestly, they’re the only ship in the Fire Nation with their very own dragon. They’re not going to squander their personal whale hunter, and they’re not above bribing the toothy charmer with snuggly blankets and head scratches.)

Zuko has a routine for both of his forms. He slithers out of his room close to dawn, half-dressed and wings flapping, and finds his currently favorite person on night watch to romp around with. (They have bets on who will be the favored sucker to pass the long hours throwing a bone, while the gold maniac scrabbles over the deck and practically throws himself overboard in exhilaration. They might subtly bribe the draik with bits of sushi and horn massages.)

Once the dragon part of Zuko expends his cheerful energy, the crew is greeted by the sullen, self-conscious teenager who is very well aware that he spent the night scaling the walls of the ship like an oversized cat owl. It’s natural for a kid to bluster and rave and try to prove he’s _not_ a cuddly little monster every time he shucks his boots. They bribe him with more sushi and send him to bed early so they can get more dragon time.

The schedule is necessary. Draiks need to catch a strong headwind to keep their wing muscles strong, and princes need to interact with crafty admirals who stalk like hunters (and who will meet a friendly fatal accident if they start snooping around after hours). Draiks have boundless energy in either form, and they have to expend it — whether in repetitive katas (trust your crew, Zuko, this hurts us more than it hurts you) or channel surfing in dragon form (please do not swim so far from the ship again, there are killer beasts and unagi that will eat you).

There are frighteningly close calls where the prince does stupid things like hire shirshus (no one quite knows what the paralytic does to dragons but the little draik is off for _days_ ) and sneak around with pirates after hours, right when his skin is itching to change. (Does he want to spend his life in a cage, Lieutenant Jee is forced to remind him, because that was absolutely suicidal and there’s no way they would’ve found him before his wings were clipped.)

General Iroh doesn’t help matters, with his erratic tourist excursions and flea market visits. (Doesn’t he realize that they’re one scale short of losing their draik to a traveling circus? All it will take is a ring punched through a wing and the kid won’t be able to transform back — not without a hole in some vital organ.)

It’s worse when the prince starts slipping out on his own. (They’re not fools. They calculate the shortened dragon hours and it just takes one innocent dusting while the prince is at the market to find his mask.) Jee subtlety mentions it, but the prince lives in denial of his moonlighting vigilantism just as much as his draik antics, so the lieutenant can only drop a somber warning for caution, and a promise that if the prince is ever compromised, some nasty person is going to be mysteriously and painfully submerged in a nice, deep trench — or better yet, a lava flow.

Long before the first head cold, General Iroh establishes that Prince Zuko must never shift forms while ill. A prince sneezing fireballs is a hazard. A miserable draik with the awareness level of a spiderfly and claws that can scour steel is a snarly death trap. Worse still, a snarly death trap that probably won’t have the sense to change back.

The crew doesn’t ask if Iroh speaks from experience. (If they’re not supposed to know, the Fire Lord wasn’t supposed to know either, and there are probably very sensitive matters being hush-hushed right now.) They look after a mopey, sniffly prince and watch for triggers (Jun tucks her hands behind her back because when his head is pillowed in his arms it would be too easy to rub those sensitive areas where the horns grow in), and the night watch spends the dull hours rigging something that is definitely not a feathery toy for a newly released draik to go ballistic over.

One summer evening, shortly after an Earth Kingdom malady leaves half the crew bunked and gagging on bitter tonics, Jee peeks in to find a shivering draik trying to fit into the prince’s bunk. The boy is half zonked with fever, too delirious to comprehend his own change. The crew doesn’t know how to deal with a sick draik, and the general has made himself useless by contracting the sickness in the first place. (If Jee had his way, he would ban any further “excursions” to tropical islands with curiously empty markets.)

The draik doesn’t barf fire or scratch his attendants. He’s a limp, shivery mess that takes three crewmen to move — two for the weight and one for the cursed wings — and when he’s set on the deck he lolls in the same position, too dazed to lift his head. Kohaku has nothing in his crate of herbs and tonics for ailing lizard-bloods. Sunlight and fish broth and heat is his dubious, head-scratching opinion.

There was always concern for a passing ship spotting a shadow fly past the moon. Now Crewman Hei constantly scouts for pirates and merchants and Fire Nation vessels. They spread Zuko’s wings for optimal sunlight and the night watch takes shifts keeping him warm. (They’re used to their little flameless winter stove; it’s alarming when the draik’s scales feel cool.) Zuko doesn’t fuss much. He burrows his head into the closest free lap and sleeps and turns up his nose at fish broth and is finally enticed into eating a bit of chopped squid mixed with fire flakes. He sulks and suns and curls his tail, and doesn’t bother to move himself so they have to roll him occasionally to make sure the iron plating beneath the blanket pile doesn’t irritate his skin. (It never does — draik hide seems to be fairly tough, but that doesn’t keep Taraou from re-tucking in a snuffly draik every chance he gets.)

The prince recovers, and returns to his self-conscious, snarly self.

The general is a fool who spends too much time negotiating over tea with a snooping admiral who would probably love to mount a pair of dragon wings on his wall.

Lieutenant Jee proposes a mutiny the moment Admiral Zhao tries to steal the crew away. All goes according to plan, until it goes wrong.

Tarao searches the wreck of jagged metal. Of all the crew, he can hold his breath the longest. They haul him out when he’s too exhausted and he quivers on his knees and shakes his head.

There’s no body.

That doesn’t mean anything.

They slip away from Zhao’s company to check the towns. No prince, and oddly enough, they never see their own faces on the mutiny posters. Short weeks later, Kohaku runs to the camp with a whoop and a poster crumpled in his fist. The sight of two familiar visages lighten hearts, even though the crew knows this is where their job gets _hard._

They still have to find the kid.

“Kinda figured dragons were immortal,” Kohaku says, scratching his mop of hair with a goofy grin. “Think there’s a reason they call Iroh the “Dragon” of the West?”

“Not a priority,” Jee says gruffly. He harbors doubts for Prince Zuko’s safety, even if he’s accompanied by his uncle. _(Especially_ since he’s accompanied by his uncle. Iroh has already proved his capacity for protecting rare and self-endangering teenagers.) They need to find Zuko before he runs back to his father, or worse, finds an Air Nomad capable of hugging the life out of squirmy, immature draiks.

Because if there’s one thing the Fire Nation doesn’t need, it’s a carefree Firebender sitting on the throne. The last Avatar was proof enough — the world isn’t ready for innocence.


	21. Unpretentious (Dragonwing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Toph romps with a dragon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: None

  
Zuko doesn’t know what to do with Toph. She’s the only one he doesn’t have a history with, and when he first pulls his boots off she stares at him like his bare feet make him a freak of nature.

He puts off transforming for a few days, trying to feel out an Earthbender who shouts and stomps and punches her teammates without provocation. When the itch in his shoulders becomes too much he finds a quiet cliff face where he can change without notice.

He underestimates his draik side’s sense of smell, and his troublesome curiosity. Because there is something else skipping about in bare feet and Zuko wants a look. He scampers up the pillars of an impressive cliff house and peers over the edge where the vibrant green child is picking at her toes. Loud talk, many teeth, challenging smirk. Playmate.

Shuffling eagerly, Zuko swishes his tail in anticipation, and then he _pounces_.

* * *

Aang doesn’t exactly think to warn Toph about playful draiks, because Zuko hasn’t brought out the wings since he joined them. He’s just snapped about formation and roaring like that’s all there is to Firebending. It’s almost like he’s forgotten how to fly.

_Maybe he hasn’t forgiven us_ , Aang thinks with a forlorn sigh. Or maybe _Zuko_ has, but the dragon side still holds a grudge. It’s hard for draiks to retain concrete relationships, Aang’s heard. Everything is based on _feelings_ , and they didn’t do a good job proving they were friends while Zuko was grounded.  
  


_I just wanted a Firebending teacher. Now I have what I wanted, and I feel like I’ve lost_. There’s nothing Aang can do about it, but he wishes Zuko would believe him. He’s changed. He’ll never take advantage of someone else’s misfortune again.

Draiks are harder to convince than people, though. Aang just hopes he didn’t jeopardize his only chance.

He’s so focused on the problem of Zuko that he misses the twitch when Toph focuses on something in the earth. The blind girl tilts her head for a moment, bewilderment scrunching her forehead, before a delighted grin bares her teeth. 

“Hey, you guys know we have another player, right?”

“Uh... does Zuko count yet?” Sokka wonders. “I mean, I know he hasn’t attacked us since spring and he might have tried to slip me a poisonous fish in a creepy ‘bonding ritual,’ but it seems to be a little early to rely on a Firebender.”

“Not Sparky, Snoozles,” Toph says gleefully. “That one!”

There’s a flash of panic in gold eyes as Zuko realizes he’s been discovered, but it’s too late to change course and he ends up whipping about midair, soaring just past Toph’s shoulder and rolling in an indignant lump of gold wings and tail.

“Hey, Zuko’s back!” Aang cheers. He swivels to his feet and then hesitates, dropping his hand as the draik flurries upright and bares his teeth, swamping gold pupils calculating the ratio of Benders to dragons. The odds probably don’t look good.

“H-Hey, it’s okay,” Aang stutters, dropping to his knees. “We’re not going to hurt you. We’re friends!”

“Aang, I think he’s still mad at us,” Katara says, huddling into herself in regret. 

“Are you guys kidding?” Toph exclaims. She plants her hands on her knees to mimic the growling draik’s stance. “He’s just a big old lizard with a lot of teeth. Come on, Hopscotch! Come get me!”

“..... Hopscotch?” Aang says, one eyebrow twitching.

Zuko bounds. Sprinting up the wall with claws made for raking through obsidian, he looks both ways divisively before flinging out all four limbs and dropping on Toph’s head. Or where Toph would have been, if she hadn’t side-stepped out of the way. Chittering nastily, Zuko zips sideways and springs headlong, clawed hands swishing through empty air. 

“Oops! Missed me again!”

“Toph, I really think this is a bad idea,” Sokka warns hastily, cringing when Zuko gets another face full of temple dust. “You’re going to make him angry, and angry dragons breathe fire!”

“He’s just playing, Snoozles!” Toph says, lifting her foot just before the draik can latch his claws around it. “You should join in. All that pent-up energy? I’ll bet Zuko was burning up keeping it all inside!”

“No thanks, I choose life,” Sokka says gruffly. He _eeps!_ as the draik dives into him in a full-bodied assault, using him as a springboard to get some velocity on Toph. “Okay, that was definitely not safe! Do you see the length of those claws?”

“He’s just an overexcited gilacorn,” Toph insists. All she has to do is dart in circles and the draik goes crazy, trying to catch her next step. “Honestly, is this what you three were afraid of? You do realize _this_ is Zuko, right?”

“Yes, we’re well aware he can turn into a dragon,” Sokka grumps.

“No, this _is_ Zuko!” Toph emphasizes. She’s distracted just long enough that Zuko sails at her head, snatching up her gold-lined headband and dropping in a roll. He flips upright and starts gnawing on the band, triumphant snarls erupting past sharp teeth. 

“Wow. That’s a violent dragon,” Toph says.

“Actually, he’s a draik,” Aang tells her. “What Sokka’s trying to say is that Zuko doesn’t remember much in this form. He doesn’t know we’re his friends. It’s my fault — I tried to tame him.”

“No, _you_ don’t understand,” Toph states, jabbing a finger into Aang’s chest. “This is the real Zuko. Everything he keeps bundled up in that stupid Fire Nation complex is trashed the moment he sprouts claws. You want to meet your real Firebending teacher? Ta-dah!”

Zuko looks up with Toph’s headband dangling from his mouth, one wing flopped over his horns.

“The Fire Nation is _so_ gonna whup us,” Sokka groans.

“Sure they will, if you keep up that kind of attitude!” Toph scolds. “Aang, if you really want to talk to Zuko, you need to get to know him in his genuine form. How can you master fire if you don’t listen to it first?”

Zuko hiccups and gags, spitting out a burnt pompom. Wriggling his nose distastefully, he nudges the battered headband back to its rightful owner. Toph grimaces.

“Nah, you can keep it. But you owe me a hot spot for this!”

Dragon Zuko seems content to fulfill his part of the bargain and let Toph snuggle into his personal space that night.

Normal Zuko wakes up in the middle of the night with a hard blink and a blush fit to boil tea. He sits up hastily and puts his back to Toph, coughing noisily into his fist.

“Look, I’m... I’m sorry about the headband. I didn’t know what I was doing and I —“

“Shut up, Hopscotch!” Toph says, slugging his shoulder hard enough that Sokka winces. “You’re okay, you know that?”

Looking curiously at his arm like he isn’t sure how it’s still attached, Zuko shrugs and lays back down, curling slightly like he still has wings and an erratically thumping tail to account for. Toph flops against him, breathes deeply, and punches him in the arm again. 

“You’re not warm enough. Turn back into a dragon.”

Zuko looks behind him like it’s the first time he’s considered his transformation as a privilege, and not a requirement of nature. Breathing out shakily, he stretches his arms and closes his eyes, and just _ripples_ into the change. Scales crawl up his neck and horns sprout, toes and fingers elongate into claws, and wings settle gently into position.

Thumping the draik’s spine to get herself some more room, Toph wriggles into the space beneath his wings and sighs.

“Much better.”


	22. Vengeance (DragonWing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dragon!Zuko is reunited with Azula. It doesn’t go well..... for Azula.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: none, except for dragon!Zuko corrupting the laws of sanity and order in the Avatar universe.
> 
> Note: The way I mashed the timeline, Zuko’s injury would have taken place really early in the Zuko alone arch, before Toph joined the Gaang. So. Lots of things never happened, and probably won’t now. Because. Zuko is a playful dragon.

* * *

Iroh watches the sky at night.

Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall. Four seasons. Four loves.

He hasn’t seen his nephew in too long.

They argued, and harsh words were spoken. Words that were undeserved, but he shouldn’t have let them rest. Zuko was confused.His anger caused him to lash out.

The dragon within must have woken disoriented. Searching for familiar faces, and finding none. Iroh expected the draik to follow his tracks back to his family. There would be mumbled apologies from Zuko the next morning, a mild inquiry from Iroh about his quality of rest, and then they would forget the whole matter.

Evening bled into morning, and Zuko never came home.

With their faces spread across the town, Iroh cannot properly search for his nephew. Any implications regarding a draik will send innumerable power-hungry trappers on the hunt; few of them as kind as June. As it is, the bounty for Zuko’s capture is insultingly petty.

Ozai knows the power bound in his son’s blood: a birthright denied to Azula. The dragon state could not be controlled by the Fire Lord. Especially in childhood, while the draik was too young to know more than its blood kin, the only influences it could retain in its dragon form were comfort or fear. Ozai was not one to sway his family with kindness.

Iroh realized it too late.

If the Fire Lord has sent for Zuko now, it is only because he determines the time is right. A young draik is malleable, easily swayed by the influences around him, until maturity settles and he becomes decisive in its loyalties. Iroh and the ship’s crew were once considered Zuko’s sentinels; ruthlessly tasked to control and bind the spontaneous affection of a banished prince.

However, by convincing a confused young man to seek a better life, Iroh has opened the gates of war against Zuko. Once Ozai succeeds in binding the draik’s allegiance through fear, sealing it with the threat of familial blood, he will have a weapon that can scale walls, infiltrate fortresses, and burn palaces to cinders.

All it will take is a hook in each wing, and Zuko will be bound to his dragon self forever, lost from the influence of a sharp mind and a brighter spirit. He will digress to little more than a beast; useful for a time, and killed when he becomes too savage to control. He will be the golden sword in the hands of the Fire Lord, polished until the glimmer fades into grey and the fire dies within.

Iroh will not let this happen.

He has already failed. His nephew made a foolish decision, and he did not stop him. Let the judgment of the world rest on his shoulders. He will not rest until he either holds his nephew in a safe harbor, or puts a dagger through the draik’s suffering heart.

  
And then through his own.

* * *

A once proud general wanders as a pilgrim, searching for his lost grandson, Li. Perhaps these kind travelers have seen a lost boy with the smile of his mother and the blight of his father’s lineage in his eyes? A young lad, carried aloft by songs of thieves and warriors?

The answer is always the same. No one with golden eyes has come by this road, except for the soldiers.

Iroh encounters the blind girl by mere chance. She gives him hope.

"Yeah, my travelling circus was looking for someone, too. Some kid with a scar. That's all I hear about. Zuko, Zuko, blah blah blah!"

"I trust you didn't hear any troublesome rumors," Iroh says uneasily. It would be like Zuko to attack without provocation. The hunter within could not be bound. All that Iroh could do throughout their voyage was attempt to change the target, but his nephew was stubborn.

"Nah, just that he's a dragon," Toph states, wriggling her toes.

It takes Iroh a few minutes to stop choking. "Does * _kerf* *kerf_ * does anyone else know about this rumor?"

"Who is there to talk to?" Toph gripes, flinging up her hands. "I'm literally in the wilderness on my own! My team is a bunch of idiots."

"At least you have someone to return to." If Zuko transformed in front of his enemies, he may have responded purely on the instinct of his fiery blood. They're fortunate the Avatar is alive, but what if the draik was injured? Lost perhaps, and suffering, without anyone to tend to his wings. Casually Iroh poses, "What became of this Zuko?"

"He flew away. Lucky him."

Exhaling slowly, Iroh sips his tea. All is well, and he is following the right tracks.

The little girl is not so blind as her eyes suggest. "You know this guy, don't you? You seem really happy that he left."

"I am merely relieved that a rare and intelligent creature was not brought to harm," Iroh says. "Dragon children are quite nearly extinct, you know. Perhaps it is better that you keep this knowledge to yourself from now on."

"But you won't hurt him." The child says it. She does not ask. "When you find him again, tell him Appa says hi. Don't ask — that's all my friend ever talks about. I figure they probably miss each other."

"As you miss your friends," Iroh discerns. "Perhaps they are still waiting for you on the trail."

"Yeah. I should probably go back," Toph mumbles. "I'm just tired of people bossing me around. That's exactly why I ran away from my parents."

"A little controversy will only help you realize your own strengths," Iroh advises her, refilling her cup. "This process may take many years, if you are unwilling to learn."

"Don't worry, I won't let them get to me." Toph smirks and blows on her tea, sipping appreciatively. The child is one to exercise caution, but she is not afraid of what she will discover in the cup. Zuko would have liked her.

Perhaps there is still opportunity for them to meet in the future.

When the blind child leaves, Iroh sits thoughtfully until the tea is cold in the pot. His nephew has encountered the Avatar in dragon form, and both the children are still alive. Perhaps Zuko is more willing to learn now, and will not shy away from the kind hands which hold him back. There is only misery awaiting him the Fire Nation, after all.

Resolutely Iroh dashes his cold tea onto the ground and starts walking, leaving the tea set behind with his few provisions. Azula will not be swayed from her mission, and Zuko is now an enemy of the Fire Nation. Ozai will not show mercy if his son returns on a tether.

* * *

Azula does not travel alone. Neither does the Avatar, but they are unlearned children standing against a Firebender. Iroh wishes his nephew stood beside him. Zuko's absence reminds him to be cautious. He redirects Azula's fire and loses her in a bloom of smoke, but the children are safe.

Aang looks around eagerly when the ash settles, yet his voice is strangely nervous as he asks, “Is Zuko with you?”

The tale they tell gives Iroh further reason for concern and relief. Zuko was indeed injured, but set to rights by the Waterbender. (There are matters left unsaid.) He spent time with the Avatar’s company, and then left on his own. (Again, there are unspoken implications.)

“We thought maybe he went back to you,” Aang says, disappointment curling his narrow shoulders.

“Perhaps if a poor old man accompanies your travels, he will find his way back,” Iroh suggests.

He is not surprised when the offer is declined.

“I hope you find him,” Aang says earnestly. “Maybe you can tell him... we miss him.”

Iroh hopes that his nephew did not break those bonds in the clashing emotions of his transformation back to himself. He sees the Avatar on his way, and prepares himself for another long journey with sore feet and an aching heart. A journey that might still end in futility.

Then he hears the scream.

High-pitched and furious, mangled with growls and snarled curses. Jets of blue fire erupt through stone. _Azula!_

Iroh runs.

Shrieks of fury turn to frustration, accompanied by a high-pitched, trilling chitter. Iroh hasn’t heard that level of hostility in years — not since the days before the siege of Ba Sing Se, when a small draik dared to confront his troublesome sister. It seems that in the absence of a stern father, old lessons have been forgotten.

Azula is going to wish she’d stayed home.

Slowing to an amble (until there’s inhuman screeching, he can take his time), Iroh peeks around a dilapidated building and smiles. “Ah, so good to see you two getting along.”

“Get him off of me!” Azula gnashes. Her arms flail, pinwheeling blue flame, but it’s not quite the ferocity of her father, and too erratically misfired to toast a draik. Zuko chirps and tucks his legs more securely around his sister’s waist, clinging to her back like an elbow leech with floppy wings.

“I’ll kill him this time!” Azula swears. Her nails rake at slender arms and Zuko attacks her topknot, gagging as long hair sticks to the back of his throat.

“Oh, what a shame the Fire Lord isn’t here to calm him down,” Iroh sympathizes, wringing his hands. “I would help, but I’m just an old man — I’m no match for a youthful, strong draik.”

“Get him away!” Azula screams. She flips herself sideways, trying to crack the draik’s wing in two. The poor child doesn’t realize that Zuko used to wrestle with catgators before they learned to avoid fresh water sources.

Growling at the dirty trick, Zuko curls around his sister like a floppy bat, golden wings muffling her enraged shrieks. There’s a flurry of dust as he rolls to the opposite wall and then slouches back, pinning Azula in his lap with claws, feet and tail. Nuzzling her neck again, he persists in that chirpy trill that’s nearly a purr of affection.

“I believe Zuko has missed you, Azula,” Iroh announces. And perhaps he knows too well how to get back at his sister. There was, supposedly, a complicated childhood before Ozai got involved.

Azula roars flame and Zuko sneezes, shaking his head clear before licking the Firebender’s cheek.

“Ew! Ew! I’ll cut your wings to ribbons, you freak!”

“He’s merely showing his affection for his littermate,” Iroh praises, settling down to enjoy the show. “You should feel honored — after three years he still remembers you.”

“I knew I should have killed you both at the pier!”

“And forgo this family reunion?” Iroh says, pressing a hand to his chest. “I’m crushed. It means so much to Zuko to see a familiar face. Why, he only had a grouchy old man to call blood kin for three years!”

“I don’t care about clans!” Azula snarls. She pries one scaled arm away before Zuko catches on to the game and releases her, springing aside for a fresh pounce. Hair frizzing in her eyes and uniform tattered, the princess steps back and huffs an angry flame before thrashing blue gusts at her brother. Zuko, predictably, gives his sister the upper hand for all of twenty impatient seconds before he pins her down for more cuddles.

Ah, there’s nothing that can lighten an old man’s heart like reconciliation between siblings. Iroh can’t wait to remind Zuko of this moment when the draik returns to himself. It’s blackmail he can use when his nephew is old enough to scold his own grandchildren.

Karma is a wonderful gift.


	23. Wardens (DragonWing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The one in which Zuko does not follow Azula back to the Fire Nation, because he’s kidnapped/rescued by well-meaning Freedom Fighters who think Mushi is hosting a tea shop ruse to show off a rare and exotic dragon. (DragonWing AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: mild descriptions of injury/violence

He isn’t looking for trouble — not the kind that leaves him clawing deep enough to scar and wrenching his arms against restraints and breathing wrong — so he doesn’t transform in Ba Sing Se. Often.

He can’t stop it sometimes. People complain about the noise, but there’s only so much Iroh can do to keep a pent-in, hyperactive draik occupied. Zuko usually wakes up with a hangover and the musty taste of drugged milk tea. It’s unfair and he knows from the scratches on Uncle’s arms that he’s fighting it every time, but what else can they do? The Dai Li can’t ever find a draik on the streets. Unlike the Blue Spirit, if a winged monster is caught it’ll never find its way back.

Zuko stops risking it after the third unplanned transformation. He slides the swords under his sleeping mat and burns the mask. Helps Uncle in the tea shop. Keeps his head down. Doesn’t give the grass-eating peasant any reasons to pick a fight.

He doesn’t feel like fighting these days. It’s been weeks since his inner fire felt hot enough to light a candle, let alone fuel his temper. (He’s not angry. He’s not excited about filling teacups and there’s nothing wrong with accidentally spilling on customers who deserve it, but he’s just... numb these days. Half of his memories seem preoccupied with traveling via sky bison and hugging his sister. The other half wants to hunt them. He stops arguing between the two and lets Uncle show him how to steep leaf juice. It’s less complicated.)

The crazy maniac with the hook swords throws him out of his nothing shell and nearly impales him. He fights, because he has to (a dragon always protects his clan and Uncle is in danger), and the creep gets himself arrested. Good riddance.

That night Zuko wakes up itchy and wriggly and vibrant and he slips out the window before blood-family-named-Uncle can find out. Because something feels cold and bad and guilty and he might have done it, he’s not sure, but he’s following the hook sword scent just to find out.

It turns out to be the best romp he’s had in a long while. He even gets to swim!

* * *

There’s a swinging lamp, a man robed in green, and a dragon.

_Wait, what?_

Jet blinks harshly and shakes his head, soothing words fading away. _There is no war in Ba Sing ..._ where the heck did that come from?

More importantly, where did they put his swords? Squirming, Jet feels for the knot around his wrists, not liking the sounds behind him. If the thing that swiped the lamp can make the Dai Li scream, he doesn't want to stick around to become the next target.

Something long and sharp slashes through the ropes, taking a little skin with it, and... _ouch_. Jet throws himself from the chair before it can strike again.

It's a dragon, all right. Or at least half of one. The other half looks like a theatrical performer, with gaudy horns and some creepy mask that makes his eyes look like a messenger hawk's, and — wait, is that _snake_ _skin_ pulsating in the crystal's glow?

The thing pads up, interchangeably hissing and chirping like it's curious but not sure whether or not Jet will make good eating. He backs away. The creature’s ear flickers. It settles back on its haunches and tilts its head, and then sneezes. Flames.

Jet breaks the chair over the thing’s head and runs for the exit.

* * *

He’s lost and colors swarm. People scream _loud sharp awful,_ his feet slide wrong and he can’t find his blood-family scent, but there’s a familiar taint in the swell of running humans, something that makes him think _fight_ and _nuisance_ and _oops_ so he follows that, because it’s going to lead him back to Uncle’s territory.

His horns ache with hot sharp pain and no one brings water to make it better. He wants the sky whipping around his face and soft warm white under his claws. He wants the light-footed orange child to smile and stupid brother to bring him fish, but he’s left hungry and lost as another scream accompanies a rock smashing the wall over his head.

He can’t smell anything familiar except for the hook swords ( _stranger enemy rescued,_ what is it?). He follows it down narrower streets and slinks lower to hide his wings.

One wing crooks awkwardly, throbbing after a rock-hand smashed it. Something tells him that’s a really bad thing.

* * *

“Jet!”

Smellerbee flings herself at his waist and clings, burrowing fingers equally scolding and trapping him from doing anything crazy again. Jet laughs and fluffs her hair.

“I told you I’d be fine. You think I’d let the Dai Li keep me down?”

Longshot stares at him with narrow lips and drawn eyebrows. _No, you’re not okay, and you’re explaining later._

Ach, his kids grew up too fast. Jet shrugs and pats Smellerbee’s shoulder. “Well, I’m back now. Let’s ditch this town before things really go haywire. It sounds like a riot back there.”

“You shouldn’t have picked a fight in the first place,” Smellerbee scolds, punching his stomach before stepping away. “We were worried!”

Terrified, anxious, dreading the thought that they’d never see him again. Jet can read into those unspoken words.

“Nothing happened. They didn’t even get a chance to rough me up,” he reassures her.

Smellerbee suddenly fixates on the red paint on her hands. “You’re bleeding!” she accuses, grabbing Jet’s arm.

Oh, that’s right. _Ouch!_

“What did this?” Smellerbee wonders, pulling cloth back from a series of shallow rakes. They bleed sluggishly, nearly clotted, but the tears are ragged. Definitely can’t pass those off as stiletto slices.

Longshot crouches to take a look. “Armadillo lion?” he ponders, baffled.

“Weirder than that,” Jet admits.

A shuffle in the alley springs arrows to Longshot’s bow. Golden orbs cringe and narrow, and the thing crouches by the wall as if to narrow the target window. Bad luck; Longshot still won’t miss.

“That’s it right there,” Jet whispers. He brushes his sword belt and grimaces, because of course they’re gone. He was lucky just to escape a labyrinth filled with Earthbenders and a crazy, fire-breathing beast.

A beast which, apparently, still thirsts for his blood.

“What is it?” Smellerbee whispers.

“Don’t know, don’t care,” Jet states. “But it took out a room full of Dai Li and it can probably fly. Longshot, shoot it.”

Longshot hesitates.

“Didn’t you hear me?” Jet scowls. “That thing breathes fire. It’s going to attack any minute. What are you waiting for?”

He looks furiously at the archer, and back at the dragon. The thing is huddling now, as if it can burrow into the earth and hide. One wing is tucked against its body, the other loosely curled. Blood trickles in a small, constant stream from a crack in its right horn.

Wounded and dangerous. “Longshot, shoot it now,” Jet hisses.

“Hurt,” Longshot observes.

“What do you expect? It attacked the Dai Li!”

“So it... rescued you?” Smellerbee ventures.

“Huh? No!” Jet denies, dragging a hand over his face. “They probably captured it at the same time. You saw what it did to my arms.”

“Rope burns,” Longshot says, nodding.

That is... not the correct observation. “It took out ten Earthbenders and breathes fire,” Jet insists. “It’s probably a Fire Nation experiment. Just shoot it and get it done.”

The thing makes a sound like a confused cat, pressing itself against the ground and pillowing its chin on grotesque, clawed hands. It’s as close to begging as Jet’s seen from a monster and he’s not buying it.

Longshot lowers his bow. “Could’ve attacked by now.”

“It looks hurt,” Smellerbee agrees readily. “We can just leave it; it’s probably just looking for a place to hide.”

“It definitely followed me,” Jet snarls. His arms throb — they’re probably already infected. “That thing wants blood, and it didn’t get to finish the job. It’s just waiting for us to let down our guard.”

“Hold this,” Longshot says, jabbing his bow into Jet’s hands. He doesn’t give him an arrow — wait, what is he doing — _what the heck?_

“Get back, Longshot!” Jet hollers, grabbing a rock. He aims for the thing’s bleeding horn, but he forgets how fast his archer reacts. The rock thwacks harmlessly into Longshot’s palm before Smellerbee grabs Jet’s hand.

“Jet, wait!” she implores him. “Something’s wrong here!”

The creature scrambles back, golden eyes housing such human betrayal that it almost looks intelligent. It curls its arms and legs in, tucked against the wall as tightly as it can manage, and whimpers as Longshot edges one foot.

“I think it’s scared,” Smellerbee whispers.

It’s a beast with horns and wings and teeth that can rip out throats and it’s already drawn blood. What is wrong with these kids?

Longshot stops moving and plants his hands on the ground, still and harmless as a pygmy puma. (Jet gets the impression that of the two predators, his archer is the deadlier. It’s the serpents in the grass who strike with venom, after all.)

Ugly thing seems to recognize this, because it cowers down, hiding its head. Longshot reaches out carelessly and just plants his hand down on the scruffy hair, right where he can get it chomped off.

“Longshot!” Jet yells.

“It’s Li,” Longshot says, brushing his fingers over a patch of red skin. “Same scar.”

“The tea shop kid?” Smellerbee says doubtfully. “A fire breathing dragon?”

“Changeling,” Longshot says, smoothing the thing’s scruff of hair like it’s a scaly cat. “Fire Nation folklore.”

“I knew he was a Firebender!” Jet hisses. Because he can’t fathom “tea server” and “dragon wings,” so that’s the easiest thing to latch on to.

“Hunted,” Longshot says, looking back at Jet like he’s the monster for asking him to shoot a murderous, mutant lizard.

“Didn’t the Fire Nation kill all the dragons?” Smellerbee muses.

“Not dragon. Draik,” Longshot says, as if _that’s_ any different.

They are not having this kind of conversation. Jet doesn’t need to wonder why a couple of Firebenders are hiding in a tea shop in Ba Sing Se. They’re all murderers.

“It’s a bloodthirsty and rabid animal,” Jet says acidly. “It has to be put down.”

“Jet, maybe he’s running just like us!” Smellerbee argues.

“Maybe... the old man doesn’t know,” Longshot says slowly.

Which is a low accusation, like the tea shop owner would stick a knife in his own nephew if he realized he was a winged menace. Jet doesn’t like that picture, but it’s not going to change his mind.

“It’s going to kill again. I won’t let that happen.”

“He didn’t kill you,” Smellerbee says softly. “He could’ve.”

When did the thing earn itself a proper pronoun? “Smellerbee, it’s an animal! Even if it was once a human, it can’t think like one now.”

Except the thing is trying to prove him wrong by clinging to Longshot’s wrist, like it’s trying to make him pay attention to the gash in its horn. Like it expects them to help.

Even if Jet might have cracked its head in the first place.

_It’s going to attack. It’s a beast, and I’ve wounded it._ Jet crouches and fingers another rock, waiting until Longshot moves out of the way.

The archer somehow shifts right into the target range and pulls off his scarf. Red on red, he winds it gently around the horn, pulling it tight enough to squeeze the broken ends together. The creature squeals but digs his claws into the wall instead of flesh. That doesn’t mean anything.

Swallowing, Jet stares at deep trenches gouged into stone. It doesn’t mean anything at all.

“Wing is hurt,” Longshot says, running a hand down the thin membrane. It’s impossible to tell — there’s no blood and Jet doesn’t know what the joints are supposed to look like — but the flappy monstrosity doesn’t tuck like the other one so it’s a pretty obvious tell.

“So what? You stopped the bleeding. Let’s get out of here,” Jet says raggedly. Before the battle rage come on and he loses one of his kids.

“Jet, he came to us,” Smellerbee says. “ _After_ you tried to gut Li. Doesn’t that mean something?”

“It probably doesn’t even remember the fight,” Jet insists.

“Yes it does,” Longshot says, tapping a long, paper-thin slice on the creature’s clawed hand. The thing sniffs it and glares at Jet, tail flicking.

“So he still saved you,” Smellerbee guesses. “That’s why you have rope burns and cuts on your arms. What really happened when the Dai Li took you, Jet?”

He doesn’t have to answer to them and they have no right to choose sides. Since when do his kids question everything he says?

“I said we’ll leave it. Alive,” Jet snaps. “We’re going now. Are you coming, Longshot?”

The archer sighs and pats the creature’s head before standing and turning away. Jet snatches the rock the minute Longshot’s back is exposed, but the beast only whines and looks around like it’s not sure where to go.

Longshot’s trembling hands close into fists and he swivels around, crouching to gently take the beast’s paw. Carefully he leads it out, slowing his steps to match its awkward, wing-dragging shuffle.

“Are you insane?” Jet gusts. “It’s an animal! It hurt itself — it’s not our responsibility!”

Longshot glares.

“It’s a Fire Nation abomination,” Jet enunciates crisply. “Those soldiers murdered our families. It’ll kill you, too!”

Now the thing is looking around with flicking ears and bright eyes, and Smellerbee is just short of mushing over it like it’s a lop-eared rabbit.

No. No, no, absolutely no.

“Jet,” Longshot says firmly. _It’s coming with us. You can choose to follow._

“Are you both insane?” Jet hollers.

The thing blinks, looking between Jet and Longshot like it’s perplexed about such strange reactions. There’s not a hint of savagery in those calmed eyes but it’s there — Jet saw it attack.

“He can’t go back,” Longshot says.

“Longshot’s right, the old man might kill him if he sees him like this,” Smellerbee says. “And that makes the Fire Nation his enemy, too. Wouldn’t it be great to have a Firebreather on our side?”

“That’s suicidal, and stupid,” Jet growls. “He’s tame now because he’s hurt. _It’s_ hurt. What happens when it gets hungry?”

Longshot shrugs. _Worry later, fix now._

His kids are suicidal and insane.

“The minute I see sparks, I’m bashing its head in,” Jet vows.

The beast chooses that moment to sneeze, and flames scorch the stones at Longshot’s feet. Jet grabs his rock. 

Turns out Longshot is really good at twisting people’s arms half out of their sockets. Sullenly Jet trails behind the snappy dragon-keeper, rubbing his wrenched shoulder and matching Smellerbee’s glare with one of his own.

“Can you take one night off from picking fights with the Fire Nation?” Smellerbee accuses.

That doesn’t deserve an answer. She knows what he’s lost.

* * *

Just because they’re ‘endangered’ doesn’t mean they ought to be rescued and bandaged like baby rabaroos. Longshot is way too excited about legendary monsters that sprout wings and project heat like a steamless sauna.

“Saves wood,” Longshot mentions glibly, pressing a hand lightly against the dragon’s spine. So Jet can also feel the warmth all the way across the clearing. They’re not keeping it for a smokeless fire pit. They shouldn’t have even taken it to the pockmarked walls and sagging roof of their hideout. (A sagging, _flammable_ roof, and Longshot is still scratching the twisted abomination under the chin. Does he realize how weird that looks?)

“There’s no broken bones,” Smellerbee says, stepping back from her analysis of the limp wing. “It’s just swollen — I think.”

“Good,” Jet says. “It can go back outside.”

“Where the Dai Li will stone him,” Smellerbee retorts. “How do we get him to change back? And how did the Dai Li _not_ notice a dragon in the city?”

“How did his doltish uncle not notice?” Jet points out. “The answer? He obviously knows. Give him back to the old man and we can expose them both.”

“Great idea. And the Dai Li won’t arrest you for making another appearance,” Smellerbee says, sitting down crosslegged across from Longshot. She angles just enough that she can keep an eye on Jet and the ugly thing. “We need to leave Ba Sing Se.”

Li the dragon splats down with a sappy groan as Longshot moves up to scratch at his undamaged horn. Why are animals such freaks and how do they beguile sensible, solemn archers?

“What if he doesn’t change back?” Longshot says. His voice is even, but after six years Jet knows that breathless huff of diabolical planning.

“He’s not leaving the city,” Jet declares.

“Not if the Dai Li have anything to say about it,” Smellerbee agrees — wait no, she’s not supposed to support Longshot’s insanity, this is not how they make group decisions!

“The purpose of the Freedom Fighters is to eliminate the Fire Nation from our free lands,” Jet reminds them. “What would we do with an incineration machine, anyways?”

“Useful,” Longshot muses.

“Fire versus fire, Jet,” Smellerbee agrees. “Maybe he’s grateful we rescued him from the old man.”

“Tea shop ruse,” Longshot proposes.

“They probably put him up for show after hours.”

“Hurt him.”

“Can you imagine how much the upper ring would pay to gawk at a dragon? No one sponsors a yellow-eyed foreigner’s shop just for good tea.”

That... sounds disturbingly plausible. And the draik seems oddly content to hide out with compassionate strangers. Jet scowls. “What kind of attention do you expect him to bring to us, then? This is supposed to be a covert operation!”

Longshot slyly whips off his hat and tries tying it over the freak’s horns. The draik finally lashes out, irritated by the pressure against his sore head, and rakes the straw masterpiece into shreds.

Jet smirks. “Any other points you’d like to make?”

“We can totally sic’ him on the Fire Nation,” Smellerbee says in horrified awe.

There is not enough ranting to emphasize the ludicrousness of that statement. “You can’t be serious!” Jet chokes.

Longshot pats the draik’s head and rescues the savaged remains of his hat. “Can I call him Feng?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will probably be the last update for a while. I’m back to my work schedule very soon and there won’t be much time for writing, but I appreciate the support and reviews given for this little project! I still hope to continue the Freedom Fighter AU and maybe add some more Wing!Shots when I have time. :)


	24. Witticism (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Freedom Fighters do a little recruiting, and Azula draws conclusions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: none

Zuko might be a little fuzzy from the outpost assault, but he knows he isn’t seeing double and that one _definitely_ wasn’t there before.

“Where did you get another ostrich horse?”

Longshot shrugs unrepentantly. “Song?”

Which doesn’t make sense, even by monosyllabic standards. Neither does the third ostrich horse trailing behind the archer.

“You paid for it, didn’t you?” Zuko prompts. “We’re in enough trouble already.”

“Lib-er-at-ed,” Longshot answers, carefully enunciating Jet’s happy word. He bobs his head towards Ursa and shrugs again.

“We talked about this, Longshot,” Zuko implores him. “These people don’t have anything! You can’t just steal their livestock.”

Frowning empathetically, Longhot looks deliberately at Zuko’s mother and then back to him. “Walk?”

So now he’s the selfish, inconsiderate son. Zuko claps his forehead and grumbles, “Fine. But nothing else.”

Beaming, Longshot drops the reins tenderly into Ursa’s hands. “Here, Mom.”

“She’s not your mother!”

* * *

“Aang needs an Earthbending teacher, and he said King Bumi is in Omashu. Why would we go to Ba Sing Se?”

“All roads lead to the capital,” Ursa murmurs, studying Longshot’s crudely sketched map. “But this is where I leave you. I’m following Iroh. I won’t let him take Azula back to her father.”

Reeling at the implications, Zuko shakes his head. “No — You can’t — We can’t separate." Is she crazy? He just found her again! "What if he captures you?”

Sly intrigue eclipses his mother’s eyes, and once again Zuko can’t compare this woman to the serene lady of the Fire Nation. “I’d like to see him try.”

She’s following Iroh. For Azula. Why is Azula _always_ the favored one?

Bracing his chin in his hand, as though to imply that surely they’ve perused and mused and contemplated his artwork long enough, Longshot taps Ba Sing Se again.

“I’m not going to Ba Sing Se,” Zuko snaps. “What is the point? The Avatar is going to Omashu.”

“There’s nothing left in Omashu,” Ursa says grimly. “The Fire Nation captured it last winter. If King Bumi is still alive, they won’t keep him where the Avatar can find him. They’ll send him to the Fire Nation, or to one of the fortified cities.”

Longshot taps again.

“All roads do not lead to Ba Sing Se,” Zuko argues. “It’s land-locked. The Avatar would be stupid to go there.”

“Not if he needs to learn Earthbending,” Ursa considers.

How does she know all this? Why does everyone seem to have an infinite knowledge of the Avatar?

Zuko just knows that if he lets her leave, he'll never find her again. There's so much he hasn’t told her. _I saved a village, flew on a sky bison, and got engaged. Surprised? That's only half of it._

"Zuko, promise me you'll stay in Ba Sing Se," Ursa pleads, slipping her arms around him like it's natural and he never left. "As soon as I find Azula I'll meet you there. Swear that you won't go to the Fire Nation on your own."

"I won't," Zuko grumbles, pulling her hands away and grabbing for his pack. "Because I'm going with you."

Gold eyes flash imperiously and Ursa's lips press into a thin line. "This is too dangerous, Zuko. I won't risk both of you. I'll meet you in Ba Sing Se."

"There's nothing in Ba Sing Se!" Zuko yells. Father wants to kill him and Uncle discarded him and now Mother wants to leave, and he's... he's done with this. He's finally _not_ running and he doesn't like the implications that nobody really missed him after all. "I want to find Azula, too."

"You will," Ursa coaxes, her voice soft and gentle and full of empty promises. (Just like Uncle.) "I'm bringing her home, Zuko. We'll be a family again."

Home is the Fire Nation. Home is empty halls and angry shadows and servants shaking their heads because there's something _wrong_ with him, he just never realized it. (And Mother mentioned bringing Azula home. She conveniently left him out of the picture.)

Longshot grips Zuko's shoulder and he realizes he's trembling, hands clenched around his ostrich horse's reins, angry words closing in his throat. (He doesn't hate her but if he says everything he'll hurt her because she doesn't mean it but what if she does?) Quivering with the effort to restrain his voice, Zuko hisses, "I'm going with you."

"I'm not losing you again, Zuko!"

"Then don't throw me away!" Scrambling into the saddle, Zuko stares down at his mother, fire in his throat bolstering his courage even when the glimpse of tears in her eyes threatens to snuff it completely. "If you really mean it, then you'll take me with you. I already told you, Uncle won’t hurt me! What's so difficult about staying with your family?"

"You don't know your uncle," Ursa says coldly. Her voices quivers, and there's something left unsaid. "You don't know what was lost."

"Then let me help you," Zuko insists. "I know how to fight and keep quiet and pick locks. I can take down the guards while you find Azula and — "

"Zuko.... _Zuko_... _Zuko!_ " Ursa interrupts, gripping his hand. She smiles, but her eyes are sad. "I know you're capable, and I'm so proud of you, but I can't risk losing both of my children. I need to know you're safe. I'm sorry, but this is one thing I must do on my own."

"Then try it," Zuko says between grit teeth. "I'll follow you anyways."

(Why is he trying so hard? She obvious doesn't need a runaway who can't master his own flame and spent the last five years mingling with outlaws. Is he that pathetic, that he can't just take the hint and let her go?)

Longshot bumps into him from the side, and Zuko blinks. The archer is already poised on his ostrich horse, bow strung and Blue Spirit mask pulled low. Shrugging, Longshot points ahead. "West."

Ursa scowls, but she’s outnumbered and the argument is already lost. She flounces to her mount and steps up gracefully, glaring at Zuko and Longshot in turn before tying on her mask. "You'll do as I say. If your uncle apprehends us, you will take Azula and run."

"Sure," Longshot says blandly. It's the same tone he uses when Jet insists they leave him to his stupid solo excursions, and they give him five minutes of alone time before trailing after him.

Ursa is not so easily dissuaded. She fixes Longshot with a cold stare and tells him, "That is my son. If anything happens to him, you'll answer to me."

Longshot swallows and shrugs, the movement jerky. It's the first time Zuko realizes his mother can be _terrifying_ when provoked.

She doesn’t look back to see if they’re following. She probably hopes to lose them along the way.

* * *

Fire Lord Azulon does not have time for an audience with the now _Commander_ Zhao. He has a Yuyan sabotage force to dislodge and a son to disinherit. Yes, the Water Tribe spy divulged a paltry measure of information before his lifespan was dramatically shortened. That does not counterpose Zhao's infinite failure.

Hahn has the brief span of a cliff drop to regret his decisions.

* * *

When Azula thinks _Uncle_ , she pictures a dowdy old man gossiping over a Pai Sho board with an infernal cup of tea warming in his hands. A boring, occasionally useful general who gave Zuko _useful_ gifts and cluttered her room with frilly trinkets. A Firebending master who didn't stop Zuko when he actually ran away (he wasn't supposed to do anything irrational, didn't the Dum-Dum ever know when Azula was teasing?) and then brought news to Mother that Zuko had vanished somewhere in the Earth Kingdom and Father wasn't sending any more assassins after him. (It was the first time Azula realized the Fire Lord was serious and big brother was never coming home.)

That was nearly four years ago, and Azula doesn't know this stern warrior who towers over her as she's 'escorted' to sit at an immaculately polished sycamore table. (There's a pot of tea and only three cups. Why is the set incomplete?)

"You have been missing from the Fire Nation for four years," Not-Uncle tells her, pouring a cup of something that smells like jasmine (she's perfectly composed, she doesn't need it!) and setting it in front of Azula with a firmness that implies it's an order. (She's not going to drink it. He can’t make her.) "I understand you must be confused."

How quaint of him, to lower himself to speak to a child. The Face Stealer made her first kill at eleven. Azula isn't threatened by this too-large-small ship with its impenetrable walls.

"We intercepted a message sent to Admiral Zhao," Not-Uncle explains, filling his own cup before setting the teapot back on the tray. He doesn't drink his tea, either. "There is a price on Zuko's head. I expected to find him among the Earth Kingdom soldiers. I was surprised."

Idle comments and endless riddles. What does he want from her?

"If little Zuzu is here, why don't you have him join us?" Azula says tartly. "I _so_ wish to see my brother." Acid on her tongue keeps her heart where it belongs. The old man doesn't need to pry at her weaknesses.

"Perhaps you misunderstand," Iroh says. "Your brother was supposed to be ransomed from the Earth Kingdom. We did not find him."

"You mean you lost him already?" Sweetness coats hateful words before they can fly off her tongue. Uncle never tried to find Zuko. His little field trips around the world were nothing more than excuses to avoid his duty. (He ought to be the next Fire Lord. He won't. Grandfather probably won’t even consider him for the throne, now. Useless dolt.)

"Perhaps you know something of the Blue Spirit," Iroh says cryptically. He's still ignoring his tea. "We believe he kidnapped Prince Zuko before he could be rescued."

"How tragic." Rescued? Incarcerated, more like. There's nothing more to this ship than cozy cells with unlocked doors, surrounded by leagues of ocean. Zuko doesn't realize what he's been rescued from.

"Azula." Not-Uncle gets serious. (As if that's possible from that permanently sour expression.) "You must tell me where to find this Blue Spirit. I have no doubt that you are in collusion with him."

"Why is the Blue Spirit always a man?" Azula wonders, exaggerating a yawn. "Maybe it's Mother?"

She realizes her slip-up the moment pale eyes gleam. "If Mother was alive," she adds hastily.

"I'm sure you are well cared for," Iroh says. How dare he make it sound warm, like he has any inkling what she's had to endure in a cramped village with too many nosy old gabbers and no servants! It’s almost a relief when the sternness returns. “You will tell me about the Blue Spirit, Azula.”

“As if I would trouble myself with riffraff,” Azula says, dipping one finger in her tea and dragging it around the cup’s rim. Ah, so the squeaking infuriates mothers _and_ pestering uncles. “I’m much more interested in how Zuzu happened to come to the Earth Kingdom outside of your notice. Unless someone deliberately lost him.”

“And what exactly are you insinuating, Azula?” The question bears threat, but Azula hasn’t pranced around Mother for years without learning a few tricks.

“I wouldn’t know anything for sure, _Uncle_ ,” she drawls out the word, watching the tension flinch into his posture, “But if I were looking for Zuzu, I would check with the staff who got him across the ocean.”

There is definitely a reaction. Not a violent one, or even one that can be outwardly perceived, but Mother is also a good liar. Azula pinpoints the measured breaths, the twitch of a vein, and the sudden furl of steaming tea, and she knows she’s guessed right.

Iroh never wanted Zuko to come home. Because there wasn’t a home to return to. Because the Fire Lord wanted Zuko dead, and Father didn’t care.

And because Iroh stole him away before Mother could carry out her evil little plan.

Zuko is alive, and it isn’t thanks to his blood family. He exists because someone else stepped in to give him that chance. Someone who obviously cared more about hunted children than the offered ransom. Someone kinder than any Fire Nation royal.

Because Iroh plainly never expected to see his nephew alive again.

* * *

They failed to rescue King Bumi. A swamp tried to eat Sokka. But when the statues burn at the Avatar Festival, Aang trudges back to Appa and leaves without saying a word. He knows what it means, now. Being the Avatar means that more people die than he can save.

Aang is ready to give up on this whole Avatar business.

“So what if one village doesn’t like the Avatar,” Katara tries to coax him. “You’re not a bad person, Aang!”

“Yes, I am.” There are bodies crushed under rubble; faces he can’t even name. He’s the last Airbender, the so-called hope of the world, and all he brings is destruction.

When someone calls him out on his crimes, it’s almost a relief. Before terror sets in, and he swallows too hard against the hook sword resting on his throat.

“Long time no see, Airbender,” Jet says with a toothy snarl. “Where’s my sparkshooter?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Aang sees steel flashes in Smellerbee’s hand. Katara hisses.

“Don’t touch her!” Sokka yells.

“Please don’t hurt them,” Aang whispers. “Please, _please_. I didn’t mean to lose him. General Fong....”

Murky eyes darken and Jet grits his teeth, the blade of grass snapping in two. “Where.”

They leave without killing anyone. Why, Aang doesn’t know. There’s blood staining his collar and Katara is crying softly into Sokka’s shoulder. Shuddering, Aang lets out a breath and squares his jaw.

“I’ve been going at this all wrong,” he admits.

“It’s not your fault,” Sokka soothes automatically. “We already knew the Avatar state was —”

“You’re not listening, Sokka!” Aang interjects. “I don’t care about the Avatar anymore! All I’ve been focusing on is finding an Earthbending teacher. I lost my Firebending teacher! We have to go back and keep looking until we find Li!”

“But the summer solstice is only months away,” Katara says, rubbing wearily at bloodshot eyes. “How can we go all the way back to Omashu when —”

“Can’t you hear yourself, Katara?” Aang snaps. “Li rescued us from the Freedom Fighters. He saved the spirit fish at the North Pole, and I — I left when I couldn’t find him. What kind of friend am I? This is why people don’t need the Avatar! I’m done being a spiritual warrior who can’t even save his own friends! I’m going back for him!”

“Aang, we all blame ourselves for what happened,” Katara starts to argue.

“No, Aang is right,” Sokka intervenes. “Katara, I think this time we have to look beyond Sozin’s Comet. We’ve never left anyone behind, and we didn’t even look past the outpost. If the Fire Nation has Zuko, we need to get him back.”

“How?” There’s no anger in Katara’s voice, but hopelessness has a similar ring. “We can’t just attack the Fire Nation. Aang barely escaped from the general. How would we even know where to find Li, anyways?”

“The general...” Aang breathes. He snaps his fingers and announces, “That’s it! Iroh would know how to find Li! I’ll bet he’d help us rescue him.”

“You want to go back to the obsessive hunter with the fire canons?” Sokka says doubtfully. “I’m pretty sure we had insurance before. If Li’s not there, it’s practically a one-way invitation to tea with the Fire Lord.”

“I know it sounds crazy, but I got a feeling about this,” Aang insists. “Trust me, Sokka. If there’s one person in the Fire Nation we can trust, it’s going to be General Iroh.”

“Hate to break it to you, but he basically ousted Li from the Fire Nation,” Sokka drawls. “Pretty sure that guy’s not into happy reunions.”

“You know what I mean, Sokka.”

“Sure. Sure,” Sokka says dismissively, waving him off. “We’ll just waltz up to the Fire Nation and ask for help finding your Firebending teacher. I’m sure the Dragon General would love to help. If we can even find him.”

“It’s worth a try, isn’t it?” Aang says uncertainly. “Katara?”

Shrugging, Katara tucks her arms tighter around herself. “I don’t know, Aang. It’s pretty risky. But you’re right; we shouldn’t have stopped looking for Li.”

“General Iroh, then,” Aang determines. “We’ll just have to negotiate from afar.”

“Yeah, pretty sure you mentioned he’d barbecue Appa if he saw you again,” Sokka says, stroking his chin in thought. “Any brilliant plans for not getting captured?”

Mischief lights Aang’s expression as he twirls his staff. “Anyone thought about joining the Freedom Fighters?”

* * *

Finding the little earth shaker is an accident. A fighting ring is just the place to look for illegal merchandise, and while the very idea turns Jet’s stomach and leaves Smellerbee quieter than he’s ever seen her, they check the back rooms. Little Green Short-Fuse finds them without even looking. She stops a moment, head tilted and champion’s belt swishing off her shoulder, and stomps them out of their hiding places. That’s useful. Really useful, if they’re looking for someone the Fire Nation wants to bury out of sight and mind.

“You want a blind girl to go with you to the Fire Nation?” The little girl chokes at Jet’s proposal. “Are you crazy?”

Jet smiles, because while she can’t see the softness in his face, it won’t hamper her hearing and he knows how to nudge kids like this. She’s young, frustrated and looking for a way out. He’s new to the territory, fresh out of contacts, and anxious to find a lost brat. They could really use her help, so he tells her.

“You need me... to help you?” The little face goes all twisty with uncertainty. Jet sighs.

“I know. It’s a lot to ask. We’re complete strangers, asking you to leave your home. It’s just... it’s _Li_. He’s not exactly safe on his own as it is, and that Air trash just left him to the Fire Nation. I can’t rest until I find him, even if he’s already....”

He lets the projected emotion swallow his voice. A little truth, a little drama, a heaping shovelful of danger, and even a Waterbender would flood small towns if he asked. (Or would have, if Li wasn’t better at twisting arms with one miserable, abandoned puppy kitten whimper. Only the Fire Nation seems to be immune to its own golden-eyed charms.)

The Earthbender girl looks more anxious, if possible. “I have to go home,” she mutters sullenly. “Sorry about your friend.”

Jet looks closer, actually _looks_ this time, and he picks up the traces he’d passed over in his haste to recruit. Hair that’s sleeker than the typical wind-scuffed wasteland of townfolk. Gold and jade hammered into a seamless headband. Those robes aren’t silk, but they’re far too fine for a little blind peasant.

“Your parents must be very worried for you,” Jet says, softer, like he understands and cares that she’s out on her own.

The impassive face twists into a surly scowl. “What do you know about my parents?”

“They probably treat you like china,” Jet says, crouching to her level, because of course. A kid her age wouldn’t be allowed near the fighting ring — not without a good deal of subterfuge. “Always worrying.... Never letting you do what you want.... Caging you in goodwill and sweet sentiments like their little bird will break a wing if she flies too far from home.”

Kind of like Li, but Li has no sense of self-preservation so it’s not an argument Jet needs to worry about.

“My parents don’t know I’m here,” the girl admits. “They think I can’t master the basics of Earthbending.”

“They’ve missed out on their greatest treasure,” Jet sympathizes. “Come with us. Please? The longer we wait the more likely it is that we’ll lose our friend forever. I’m begging for your help.”

She can’t say no. Not with a whole world ahead of her and allies who will take her beyond her gilded cage. She craves adventure and the chance to prove her skill. Jet can give her all of this. Asking for help finding a missing kid? It’s a small exchange — one that even a miniature crusher can’t pass up.

“I guess I can go for a little while. My parents will freak.” The girl whispers the last part to herself, and Jet smirks.

“Maybe it’s time they learned you’re made of sterner stuff,” he coaxes. “I’m Jet, by the way, and my friend here is Smellerbee.”

“Toph,” the girl announces. “You guys have funny names.”

“Stick with our rig and you’ll earn one for yourself,” Jet promises.

“I’ve already got my own name,” Toph says brashly, grinning ear to ear like she knows Jet’s kind and she’s still choosing to go along with it. “Call me the Blind Bandit!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Question for the masses: I’m used to a measure of interaction on fanfiction.net, but every site is different. Do people like review replies, or is that just weird on AO3?


	25. Dragon!Wing Concept Art

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quick acrylic sketch for Longshot meeting dragonwing!Zuko. (Jet does not like scaly Firebenders cozying up to his kids.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For some reason I'm having trouble with this picture. It shows up on my phone just fine, but not my computer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #neocolai can’t draw and don’t care #ugly art #longshot adopts all sunflowers and dragons #jet stop picking fights with the fire nation #iroh’s never getting zuko back now


	26. Xenodochy (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The royal family doesn't do "communication." That's the least of their problems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Xenodochy: the extension of hospitality towards strangers (In this chapter, the lack thereof.)
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: None

“Again.”

The somber, gravely dismissal grates on her pride. Nose curling disdainfully, Azula spirals and kicks out, casting one flame to the soldier on her right, a hand-slashed flume to the one on the left, and a second kick to the soldier standing before her. They catch her flames seamlessly (how is this so _easy_ for them?) but the third soldier stumbles under the heat. Well then, she’ll just have to make her fire a little hotter next time. Smirking, Azula relaxes into a slump and yawns. 

“Is this all the Fire Nation is capable of?”

“Your Firebending is impressive.... for a beginner,” Not-Uncle says imperiously. He frowns at her nonchalance, and Azula puts a little more ‘bored’ into her stance. “Your footwork is sloppy, your breath is wasted in your attacks, and you’re relying on the impression that your opponent won’t retaliate with fire. Do it again — the way I showed you!”

“You’re wasting your time, _Uncle_ ,” Azula says, turning the namesake into a two-syllable mockery. “By the time you reach a Fire Nation port I’ll be long gone, and then what will you tell your precious Fire Lord?”

“You are not a prisoner here, Azula,” Iroh reminds her ruthlessly. “You are a princess. Your mother may have neglected her duties, but I will not.”

“Does Zuzu have a duty left unfulfilled?” Azula wonders. “Perhaps you should’ve thought of that before you left him in the Earth Kingdom.”

“You will not speak of the matter again, Azula.” The tone is a warning, but the crossed arms are a defense. Does his own crew not know they’re answering to a traitor? “Repeat the form.”

“If an heir is so important, why haven’t you provided one?” Azula prompts, stretching her arms unhurriedly. “You are the eldest son, after all.”

“You might test my patience, Azula, but beware: your father will not tolerate similar behavior.”

“Oh, does Daddy miss me?” Azula taunts. She rebinds her hair with a grimace. Stupid, sweaty strands are in her face — again! She ought to let the soldiers burn it off in their next onslaught. “He never sent anyone. Just like he didn’t ask after dear Zuzu. I’m starting to wonder if no one wants us on the throne. Perhaps that’s all the Fire Lord really wants — a big, empty chair to rest his feet on while the capital burns around him.”

Iroh doesn’t reprimand her — verbally. He lashes out with lightning strokes of flame, punching the boards between her feet, instigating a panicked dance that leaves her hair in a new disarray and smoke stains on the too-long silks she’s forced to wear. Iroh tucks his hands back into his sleeves while Azula clutches her side and gasps. It would be less infuriating if he would only _look_ angry while he scolds her. 

“The form again, Azula.”

This is the point when Mother snatches up her hairbrush with severe intent, but Azula doesn’t know what boundaries to tread with her estranged family. She does remember that Uncle was always lax. Perhaps it’s time to test that patience.

“I think you’ve proven your tolerance enough today, Uncle,” she drawls, straightening with an effort and examining her dirt-encrusted, chewed nails. “Isn’t it time you showed these humble stooges what you really think of your brother’s daughter?”

_Strike me_ , she challenges. _Prove you can’t handle a little girl. You can’t buckle me down unless you strike first._

_You’re still only half as terrifying as Father._

Iroh’s brow furrows with intent, and Azula realizes she might have underestimated the old man. “Very well, then. It seems you need a short respite to cool down.”

It’s the last thing Azula hears before two of the guards snag her arms and flip her unceremoniously over the railing. Saltwater closes over her ears and she only has Mother to curse that she knows how to swim. Not-Uncle probably knows that — he wouldn’t let his precious heir drown.

When Azula looks up and sees him watching smugly over the railing, she ducks under the water and swallows, just to spite him.

There are a lot more frantic guards jumping ship after that. It isn’t worth the burning in her lungs and throat afterwards, but General Sourpuss gets the picture.

Azula won’t be threatened.

* * *

Mother doesn’t lose them, or slip away in the night, or redirect them onto a side road to nowhere. It seems that once she knows Zuko will wander heedlessly until he falls upon her trail again, she stops trying to convince him to leave.

Besides, Longshot is an excellent tracker. She wouldn’t stay lost for very long.

There isn’t much to talk about on the trail. Ostrich horses are conversation killers with their wobbly gaits, and there’s too much dust in the air to waste breath coughing. When they stop to examine the ground, innocuous signs in grass and rock telling Ursa which direction they’re headed, it’s Longshot who dominates her attention as she explains the traits of plants and rock shavings, and how the earth changes as they draw nearer to volcanic soil. 

When they stop to camp for a few hours, it’s Zuko’s time to tuck under his mother's arm and just _listen_. Ursa talks about the Earth Kingdom and what they’ve lost, the people oppressed, the lines of haunted soldiers marching to a fate that no one deserves. Zuko tells her about moonlit eyes and water spirits, and the aloof congeniality of the Northern Water Tribe versus the gentleness of Uncle’s crew. (Mother goes tight-lipped whenever he mentions Uncle, but he tries to convince her anyways.)

He doesn’t tell her about night raids and komodo rhinos and friends in the forest — that isn’t his right to share. He tells her instead about soaring on a sky bison’s back and meeting a warrior from the Southern Water Tribe and how the Avatar is only a child, but he already carries the whole world’s hopes. He tells her about children who bend like masters and how the faint burn scars on his arm came from a training accident with the Avatar himself. (Really, it was an accident — Master Jeong Jeong isn’t at all like his old tutors.) He tells her about weapons that spin midair to strike where the first shot missed, bouncy lemurs that hog fruit and stare vacantly like creepy mediums, and Water Tribe delicacies that taste sweet and squishy and fermented and _ew_ all at once. He makes her laugh, and that’s the best part of all.

Work-calloused fingers card through his hair at night until he can’t keep his eyes open any longer, and when he wakes up she’s still there. (He’s never sure if it’s because she chose to stay or if Longshot is still the most exasperating watchdog ever, but he tells himself that she stayed for him. Lying is easier to cope with than loneliness.)

Four nights into the search, they argue again. 

“You couldn’t have left alone, Zuko,” Ursa murmurs, while Longshot is pretending to be engrossed in sketching his new map and the crackling fire conceals their voices. “Even you couldn’t run so far — though I remember you loved to outpace your sister.” Fondness is a paper-thin shell over fierce possession. “Who helped you, Zuko?”

He can’t tell her. That would betray.... and he can’t do that, not when she already _hates_ him and she doesn’t even know all the good he’s done. 

“I told you, Mother. I ran away," Zuko says lightly. "I wasn’t thinking at the time.” _But I know better now. I’ll be good this time. You’ll be proud of what I’ve become._

“Zuko.” The admonishment is gentle, but it’s a rebuke all the same. 

“Why did you and Azula come to the Earth Kingdom?” Zuko wonders, widening his eyes to impress that it’s a harmless introspection and never a distraction. (It almost never works on Jet, but Pipsqueak lets him get away with it.)

“Zuko, I asked you a question.” 

The firm tone ought to make him squirm. He does, but it’s for the wrong reasons. He’s too hot and irritable to apologize.

“You haven’t told me anything about home,” Zuko insists. “Why you left; how long you’ve been gone. Are the creepy old ladies still at the summer house? And what about Azula? Has she mastered Firebending yet?”

On anyone else it would work. It ought to work on Mother. She ought to laugh and smooth his hair and gently chastise him for his endless questions before revisiting her own problems tomorrow.

It doesn’t work this time.

“Zuko, who brought you across the ocean?” Ursa asks directly. “Who took you from your home?”

That’s... an accusation. “I wasn’t kidnapped!” Zuko exclaims, aghast.

“You were a child,” Ursa answers him firmly. “You didn’t ask to leave the Fire Nation.”

“Maybe I did! Maybe I really believed Azula this time and I just wanted out!” Even as Zuko says it, it doesn’t make sense. Out from what? The tutting of servants and the softness of clothes that didn’t scratch his skin? The safety of guards during the night, and the happy knowledge that if he expected something to eat, he only had to ask? What did he have to lose from the palace?

Only the sense of failure. The lack of belonging. The _luckiness_ to survive.

“Maybe I didn’t want to stay,” Zuko says between grit teeth, fingernails digging into his palms. “Maybe I was tired of being the one who got left behind.”

Left in the dust by Azula. Left out of the war council by Father. Left in the dark by Mother’s secrets. Left in the hands of strangers as Uncle boarded his ship. It’s always the same. Only the Freedom Fighters had enough loyalty to bring him back to their camp every time he ran away. No one... no one else _cared_.

“Zuko, I want to listen to me closely,” Ursa says, her hand warm and compelling on his shoulder.

He’s tired of listening to her make excuses for everyone except Uncle.

“Then why don’t you tell me everything?” Zuko snaps, shrugging her away. “Why did _you_ leave your duty? Why take Azula into the middle of nowhere and then let something happen to her? Why do you hate Uncle Iroh so much? Is that why you wanted to leave me behind? What did I do _wrong?_ ”

He shudders, words spent, the ugly, croaking shouts seeming to echo in the fields around them. Longshot can’t pretend not to have heard anymore, but he keeps his eyes shadowed under his hat. Shuddering, Zuko rests his head on his knees.

He’s ruined it. He lashed out, and he can hear his mother shifting so he won't see her face. Why, why can’t he ever do anything right? Why can’t he shut up and just let things happen?

“You don’t know what you left behind,” Ursa says, her voice breaking before she schools it to an even monotone. Her restraint agitates him and leaves him in awe of her control. “You might have been safe away from the palace, but I thought you were dead. Your grandfather sent out _so_ many soldiers. Every day I waited for the report that a patrol had returned with your body. Do you have any idea how that feels, Zuko? I waited to hold my son one more time before they burned him! Don’t you dare tell me I never wanted you home!”

“I’m here now!” Zuko pleads. “Why are you trying so hard to leave me behind again?” He swallows, chokes, because he knows. It’s always been like this, but he disillusioned himself. He told himself she cared for more than a little fire show. “I know I’m not as good as Azula. I can’t keep up with her, I don’t even know how to bend properly anymore, but I swear I’ll get better —“

“I don’t want to hear any more about Azula!” Ursa shouts, wiping angrily at her eyes.

Stunned, and equally perplexed, Zuko challenges, “Then why is everything about her? I just found you and you want to —”

“Zuko!”

He quails, because Mother is _yelling_ and there’s a part of him that will always back down at a sharp tone.

“That's enough!” Ursa commands. “This isn’t about Azula! Not everything is about this constant rivalry you have with your sister! I’m going after her because your uncle is bringing her back to the _Fire Nation_. Your grandfather will twist her and crush her into a ruthless general, worse than any the Fire Nation has seen before, and I won’t stand idly while she’s corrupted. Do you think he’ll have mercy if he has both of you locked away? If your uncle finds you again he will be forced to surrender you, Zuko. He will not let you escape. He’ll deliver you to your grandfather and if you are spared a public execution, your father will be ordered to kill you himself — and I doubt that will be enough to rattle him. I took Azula away from the Fire Nation to save her, and I’m not going to lose you again because your uncle is a worthless flatterer who caters to the Fire Lord’s whims! Do not complain to me about Azula, Zuko — you don’t know what it would do to me if they killed you again!” 

Gold eyes flash with inner flame and Zuko stutters, quelled under the heat. “I — I didn’t mean — I’m sorry —“

Closing her eyes, Ursa bows her head and raises one hand. “Enough, Zuko. Please. What’s done is done. We’ll speak no more of this.”

“But I didn’t mean — what I was trying to say —“

“Zuko, please!” Ursa implores him. Tears swamp her eyes again and her voice is breaking with something (it’s not anger, or disappointment, and somehow that’s _worse_ ) and all Zuko can do is stammer apologies and excuses that don’t come out right and only make things worse.

“Just... let it go,” Ursa whispers. “We’re both tired. We’ll talk more in the morning.”

They won’t. The memories are fragmented, but he knows she’s said this before. There won’t be a morning between them. She’ll move on as if nothing happened and he’ll spend the rest of the day trying to fix whatever he messed up.

It’s like he never left home.

Flopping into his bedroll, Zuko pulls the cover over his head and squeezes his eyes shut, listening. Waiting for the scuff of footsteps leading away from the camp. Hoping he won’t hear her crying, because she never has and if he brought her to tears it would be the worst betrayal.

He doesn’t hear anything except a sigh. Fabric rustling feebly, as if she's sitting down but doesn't feel like sleeping it off. He doesn’t know what to do.

Through a crack in his blanket shroud, Zuko catches Longshot’s stare long enough for the archer to grimace at him over his plight. Scowling, Zuko yanks the cover tightly over his face. He doesn’t want to wait here, baiting his friend’s sympathy and wrenching his mother’s guilt. He needs to move — to get away from the turmoil inside — but _where?_

Doesn’t matter.

Flouncing upright, Zuko flings off the blanket and yanks on his too-hot Water Tribe boots, kicking a dust clod as he stomps away.

“Where — ?” Longshot stutters, like he’s on the verge of wasting words in full sentences because everything is so _awkward_ and no one's behaving normally.

“For a walk,” Zuko says stiffly. His voice is gravel in his throat and he hates it. Hates everything the Earth Kingdom made him. Hates that his own mother doesn’t recognize him now.

Longshot sighs and strings his bow, laying it close at hand. He won’t follow, but he’ll be there if there’s trouble. This isn’t the first fight Zuko’s walked away from — he just thought those had ended when he left Jet in Gaipan.

Maybe it would’ve been better if he’d stayed behind.

* * *

“I don’t have to stay with your stupid gang, you know!”

“The Freedom Fighters are a _team_. You don’t want to participate, you don’t have to stick around!”

“Fine!” 

“Fine! Go back to your little golden cage in the village and listen to your parents flutter every time you bend a pebble! You want to be useful? Grow a spine and act like you have something to fight for!”

“At least I have parents to go _back_ to!”

“At least I cared about mine enough to avenge them! All you care about is yourself!”

Finally there’s someone mouthier than Zuko to boss Jet around, and it still ends the same. Badly. Although usually the scuffles don’t end with a rock shelf sliding out from Jet’s feet. 

Rolling onto his elbows, the fearless leader glares. Smellerbee shrugs.

“Don’t. Say it,” Jet hisses.

“I like her,” Smellerbee states.

There’s that pure, miserable grimace of defeat she remembers from the days when Longshot used to braid a Firebender’s ponytail, before Jet made the cut official and Li joined their group. It’s been a long time since Jet had to be talked down.

“You know what?” Jet says curtly, rolling onto his back and folding his arms. “You like a snarly crusher that much? You go bring her back.”

“Okay.” She figured he’d capitulate. They need an Earthbender to carve the terrain, and this one has added bonuses — they’ve avoided three caravans and a troop of nasty rhino riders since bringing Toph along.

“It’s just because she’s a girl, isn’t it?” Jet gripes. “Females always gotta get along.”

“She trounced you,” Smellerbee says brightly. “She’s a keeper.”

Narrowed eyes tell her _exactly_ what Jet thinks of her analysis. Seeing as he’s about to be the only boy in a troop of females... well, better yet to bring Toph back quickly. It’s time Jet learned how exasperating it feels to be the _only one_.

Yep, Smellerbee aims to deliver a real team pep talk. Girl to girl. She just hopes they get a little more dirt rubbed into Jet’s shining ego before they catch up to Longshot again. 

It might be nice to have a sister for once.

* * *

The Fire Nation is compelled to move swiftly. Rumors of a massing army in the North accompany whispers of rebellion in Omashu. There are pockets of allies; villages who hate the Avatar, and civilizations who crave survival over freedom. When the warships embark, there will be no discrimination between sentimental allies and foes. All will burn.

Zhao stands at the helm of his small ship — a humiliation in itself, assigned to him to make an admiral-turned-commander feel negated.

Very well. Under the guise of trailing after the Fire Lord’s navy, Zhao has a little side trip of his own. It won’t be difficult to lose his way in the sea of black smoke, and once he reaches the Earth Kingdom’s shore, he will finish the task he started in the North Pole. 

All will be returned when he throws the lost prince at the feet of the Fire Lord. The Dragon Warrior will finally break, and Zhao will write a new chapter in the history of the Fire Nation.

He hasn't lost yet. He's merely biding his time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like Zuko argues with everyone, even after his "Ember Island revelation," so yeah... he and Mom aren't going to pair well when tempers fly. (She murdered her father-in-law. There's gotta be something nasty hiding beneath those perfectly blase smiles and tender lies.)


	27. Yang (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zuko finally stops running and reflects on his future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have another chapter, because I don’t like leaving Zuko in a mopey state for long.
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: none

Dealing with Jet always left him tired the next morning. Fierce words and repartees, misunderstandings and repetitious clauses that all implied, _“I’m the leader so I say so.”_ Instinct made Zuko want to punch out at the nearest rock, but that used to accompany fire and for a long time that meant hook swords in his face. He learned how to pen the burning needles inside, hands smarting and heat swelling in his stomach, until the frenzy ebbed and he could talk rationally without shedding sparks.

Running helped. Complaining to Longshot usually fixed the rest.

He’s been running for what feels like hours, but he’s still angry. He won’t punch fire into a dead log, even if Master Jeong Jeong passed along a few lessons and technically no one is going to yell at him for setting the brush on fire. But the last few weeks have been dry and he doesn’t want to run the locals out of their village. Besides, Mother can’t bend away a wildfire if it catches up to her.

The reminder of their argument forces more frenzy into Zuko’s stride, until he’s tripping up, and then hobbling, kicking each stride just to expend energy. He beats the air with harsh strokes, wasting breath until his chest aches, and he _still_ wants to hit something.

There’s something wrong with him. He’s always been angry — more than Sneers. More than Jet, even. Normal people don’t breathe _fire_ when they’re upset. He doesn’t even know why he’s mad anymore — it’s not even Mother, he’s half-forgotten what she said now that a familiar roar is filling his ears — but the twisting in his chest won’t calm down.

_Why am I so bad at being good?_

He falls to his knees only because he can’t take another step. His arms quiver to hold him up, and he can’t see anything but grey for several sharp, breathless minutes. As soon as he has enough air he yells and slams his fist into the dirt. No fire, but the explosion of movement frees a little of the knot inside. He hits the ground again, and again, snarling unintelligible blasphemies, until muddied blood coats his fingers and he can flop onto his side and _breathe_ without screaming.

The fire in his chest is still there, but he can control it now. He doesn’t have the strength to be angry anymore. It’s almost like detachment, something he hasn’t felt since... since....

Since he last hashed it out with Jet, shortly before the rhino incident, Zuko realizes numbly. Swords and fists and yelling until they were both too tired to walk back to the hideout. Jet started it, but Zuko threw the first punch.

_What is wrong with me?_

He doesn’t like violence. He hates it when he trails behind the Freedom Fighters and steps into a puddle of blood. He doesn’t tell them he knows what they’re up to; it’s like they’re ashamed to tell him — like they’ll ruin something good inside of him.

If he hates war so much, why does he always pick the fights?

_I was always angry_ , Zuko realizes, curling onto his side and breathing through the twisting pulse in his chest. Most of the time it was with Azula, or his tutors, and — more often than he wants to admit — Uncle. He used to wrestle Lu Ten until they were both bleeding or scorched, and nobody seemed to mind.

“Fire is in the blood,” Uncle once calmly reassured a servant — as if that excused everything.

Father was angry, too, although he didn’t have to shout to prove it. Mother was the one smiling between her teeth during parties, waiting until nightfall when everyone could hear her complaints through the thin walls. Uncle just got grouchier — Father always said he was too lax when Lu Ten yelled in his face. Azula ... she was the only one who seemed to rationalize and adjust her behavior accordingly. Sort of like Longshot. She was the only Firebender in the family to respond in cold blood.

Why was she different?

Perfect, poised Azula. Zuko snorts and shakes his head, sitting up to brush the dirt off his arms. Azula had to be flawless in everything, even in her temperament. No wonder everyone wants her. And where does that leave him? The lucky one. The one who trails behind. The forgotten.

_I don’t belong anywhere._

Rubbing his arms as sweat turns to chills, Zuko looks around the unfamiliar terrain, trying to compare it to a rock-entrenched forest. But... that’s not home, either. The waning moon is the same that shone above an icy kingdom, and he is no more welcome in the North than a koi fish in an unagi den. 

So why did the chief believe him when he vowed his loyalty to a cherished daughter?

Closing his eyes, Zuko stretches his hands in the moonlight and reflects on a pond in a chi-warmed garden. He felt... different, there. No longer in turmoil. Aggression tempered, at least for the moment. Maybe it was the cold, or the lack of enemies nipping at his throat. Or maybe he should’ve looked beyond the hypnotic swish of circling fish, and realized the wonder Yue was trying to share with him.

Balance.

How does a princess emanate warmth and hospitality when her family shuns strangers?

How does a Firebender answer with words and not flames?

How does an archer fluctuate like the wind, choosing his allies rather than centering on familiar ground?

Maybe the peace of the garden wasn’t him being different. Maybe ... that’s what could be, if he stopped fighting. Stopped pretending. Stopped trying to be everything he seems to lack.

It’s a cruel revelation, because Zuko knows he _can’t_ do it. He can’t change what he is inside. Everything burns, and some days he can’t stop it from lashing out. He’s no closer to the balance in the garden than he was when he first ran away. It’s one more failure to add to his list.

Opening his eyes, Zuko stretches his fingers in the moonlight, clenching them into a fist and straightening them again.

Maybe he shouldn't change what he is — no more than Yue can stop being a princess. But she's chosen to do good with her position, while he.... he's fighting to prove his own valor.

“What am I doing?” Zuko whispers. His ruined voice haunts him. He can’t change that. His family moved on while he was away. He can’t change that, either.

Maybe it’s not about reconciling the past, as much as claiming the future.

That’s what Yue does. What Longshot chooses every day he rides further away from Gaipan. Azula must have faced the same revelation when she was still crawling, when she suddenly stopped crying and started watching instead.

Clinging to his mother... his uncle... his promise to the Avatar.... Zuko’s had it wrong all along.

Breathing out shakily, Zuko re-laces his boots and stands. He’s going back, but not to apologize. Maybe he isn’t wanted. Maybe he is. He can’t afford to think about that now. He’s a prince, engaged to a princess, and if he wants to see Yue again, he’d better burn a safety zone around them before fire engulfs their world. He can’t teach the Avatar Firebending, but he has something better to slip into the Fire Nation.

Himself.

A pathetic, untrained child is no threat to the Fire Lord. A banished prince is only a prize. If that warrant gets him into the throne room himself....

Longshot is going to hate this plan. He'll follow along, anyways; the Blue Spirit won’t let Zuko go in alone. Meeting Uncle and stowing back to the Fire Nation? That is exactly what needs to happen.

Because if Zuko’s going to kill the Fire Lord, he needs to be the most unsuspecting assassin the Earth Kingdom ever spawned. Forget the Avatar and the prophecy. Forget making amends with his estranged sister. He’s taking a hand in his own destiny for once.

* * *

Far across the plain, Jet sits up with a shiver. There's definitely an ill wind out tonight.

"Fine, you can keep traveling with us," he gripes, rolling his eyes at the little crusher who's snuggled up to Smellerbee in their stupid stone tent, whispering like there's a secret afoot — and it's no secret _who_ they're talking about when they're _giggling_ every third sentence! "The minute we find our team, you're free from any obligation. You want to go back home, that's up to you."

It's supposed to sound like he's offering a favor, giving the poor naive child a chance to prove herself. Smellerbee cackles and Toph sticks a finger in her ear, clearing out invisible debris. 

"What's that? You can't find one itty-bitty sparkler without my help? All right, I'll forgive you for being a jerk."

Smellerbee _howls_ and Jet rockets up from his bedroll, snatching up Li's new dao swords. They're heavy and unwieldy and he doesn't know why the kid favors them so much, but it gives him a new method for hacking something apart. There's a nice, lightning-scorched willow that's begging to be hewn into firewood. Maybe it's disrespectful to use a couple of good blades for an impromptu saw, but he's pretty sure Li won't mind.

It's better than slapping a sword into the kid's ungrateful face once they catch up to him.

Toph and Smellerbee titter and whisper late into the night, and roll up beside each other like long-lost friends. They don't need to scrounge for kindling for days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Zuko = finding balance = yay? 
> 
> Yeah, no. He’s finally showing some self-motivation and proactivity, but he’s still operating on teenage hormones and a really bad game plan. Oh Zuko, you really need Jet to knock some sense back into your head before you get yourself killed.
> 
> (And Jet... can't deal. Poor guy has finally met his match.)


	28. Zany (Freedom Fighter AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Zany” - amusingly unconventional and idiosyncratic (A.k.a. Toph Beifong)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Avatar muse just snuffed, sorry y’all. Work is very demanding right now, and the Avatar muse was eaten by a turtleduck. It’s not likely this series will continue.

The game is stupid. The old man is stupid. The only reason Azula is still sitting here is because she has nothing better to do.  
  
She lost the last two games. _Lost_. Her strategy was flawless and her soldiers executed to perfection, and she was swiped from victory in the peak of her triumph.  
  
“You underestimate the power of the lowly and humble lotus tile,” Not-Uncle scolds her. “Until you recognize the value of those beneath your status, you will never win.”  
  
Oh, so it _is_ a game of morales after all. Azula respect your elders, be kind to the street filth, go carry something for that hideous cripple, blah blah blah. No wonder Iroh and Mother got along so well.  
  
“The lotus will never be Fire Lord,” Azula informs him. “Why should I pamper the one who’s expected to sacrifice himself on the front lines?”  
  
The grave expression turns absolutely captious. “You do not understand, Azula,” Iroh says tersely. “It is not the might of the lotus tile that gives it strength, but the power it lends to its allies. You cannot succeed without the support of your subjects. If you rule without others, you will die alone.”  
  
“How can I rule without others toddling after me?” Azula asks, leaning back on her palms with a sigh. “Honestly, Uncle. Your words of wisdom endlessly contradict each other. I do wish you’d be consistent.”  
  
“Perhaps you will understand more as you play the game,” Iroh hints. “It is your turn.”  
  
As it has been for the last ten minutes. She can’t win, obviously — the general has her trapped in a corner — but maybe he’ll flounce off if she stares at the tiles long enough.  
  
Iroh is infuriatingly patient.  
  
“General.” A stern-faced soldier bows curtly in the doorway, her short frame barely enough to block the sunlight. It’s probably the same crewman who “generously” replaced Azula’s perfectly suitable black garments with one of her spare uniforms. Ugh.  
  
“I gave orders that we were not to be disturbed, Jun,” Iroh says evenly.  
  
The soldier straightens subtly. There’s barely a flicker in the eyelash, but it’s obvious that Uncle isn’t a cuddly codfish on this vessel.  
  
“Your highness, we’re approaching shore. You requested to be informed upon the first sighting.”  
  
Iroh frowns deeper, but he doesn’t bark at the soldier for existing. “So I did. Very well. Lieutenant Jee is assigned to guard the princess. I will return in two hours.”  
  
“Very good, your highness.” Another emotionless bow and the soldier retreats two steps to stand outside the door.  
  
Flinty gold eyes shift onto Azula and she yawns. “I expect you to adhere to my instructions in my absence,” Iroh warns her.  
  
“Of course, Uncle. Where else would I go?” Where else indeed. She knows how to swim. They’re not far enough away for the Face Stealer to tremble over a little exercise.  
  
“I am not jesting, Azula,” Iroh states. “Only a warrior without honor runs from her post.”  
  
“Is kidnapping the same thing?” Azula ponders, idly shifting tiles around until the Pai Sho board looks more like a dragon mosaic. “I believe I left chores unfinished at my post back home. Shame that I’m never expected to return.”  
  
Mother is going to chew up the soldiers for information regarding her daughter. There might be prison breaks. And a revolution.  
  
For a moment Azula sees her mother parading down the street with a jook ladle in one hand and a sketch of her daughter in the other, an army of beggars and castaways trailing behind her. It’s not funny because it’s too realistic. Why couldn’t she have absconded with Father, who would’ve incinerated every last town until he found his daughter?

Although, statistically speaking, Mother will only have _words_ when she drags Azula home. Father might use corporal punishment fit for soldiers and traitors. Perhaps it’s better for her to rescue herself and wait until she’s legally an adult to enamor Grandfather with her abilities. (Or boot the decrepit, shriveled man off the throne if Father fails to assassinate him.)  
  
“Rest assured, your talents will no longer be wasted in the Earth Kingdom,” Iroh says tonelessly, jolting Azula out of her musings. Bothersome old codger. “Your destiny lies beyond walls of stone.”  
  
Azula smiles and places the lotus tile in the dragon’s eye. “For once we concur. How soon will we reach shore, Uncle?”  
  
“We?” The general huffs. “You misunderstand, Azula. My business here does not require your influence. We will discuss your part in future politics upon my return.”  
  
“Of course,” Azula says between her teeth. Because the dolt is so stupid, he doesn’t even realize he’s the only one shrewd enough to sabotage her plans before she can execute them. He’s leaving her with a placating lieutenant who isn’t fit to lay his cloak under the Fire Lord’s shoes, and mocking her for it.  
  
Duty and honor? Azula needs neither. She has a name and a reputation outside of the Fire Nation, and she doesn’t need a title to inspire fear, like her grandfather. She doesn’t need the crutch of an army, like Uncle. And she certainly doesn’t have to depend on her bending to instigate fear, like Father. She is sly and quick and sneaky and she needs nothing more than her own wits to steal back the game.  
  
Uncle left all his little tiles undefended.  
  
He won’t look so complacent when he returns to an empty room.

* * *

Zuko never finds his way back that night. That’s okay, because the Freedom Fighters are well aware of his bad sense of direction and tendency for falling prey to a random flock of raccoon-crows or territorial rabaroos. Longshot tracks him down by sunrise and takes a seat on the least uncomfortable looking rock, waiting for Zuko to talk about what’s bothering him.  
  
“I’m going back to the Fire Nation,” Zuko informs him. He folds his arms, bracing for an argument.  
  
Longshot doesn’t react instantly. It’s the best thing about him; he simply looks down, breathes in, and makes his point. Casually the archer states, “Jet is waiting in Ba Sing Se.”  
  
That’s... not the contradiction Zuko was waiting for. In fact, what does that even have to do with —  
  
Oh.  
  
_Oh_.  
  
“All roads lead to Ba Sing Se?” Zuko splutters. “You were planning to drag me back this whole time?”  
  
Shrugging unrepentantly, Longshot answers, “Brother.”  
  
That’s... that’s not fair.  
  
Zuko has to sit down.  
  
Why — why of all times, does Longshot have to bring that up? Just when Zuko is ready to throw it all away, take back what he abandoned, fight for a _good cause_ for once, Longshot has to pull something so sentimental and irrefutable that... he just... he can’t....  
  
He can’t do this.  
  
He won’t.  
  
“I’m not going back to the Freedom Fighters,” Zuko says in a low voice, trembling fists resting on his knees.  
  
Longshot doesn’t speak again.  
  
“I can’t go back,” Zuko explains. “I’m not going to spend my whole life hiding away, whittling down a few soldiers while the Fire Nation grows more powerful. I can — I could _be_ the Fire Lord!”  
  
He huffs, dizzy at the idea, because it’s so outrageous but it’s true. He could be Fire Lord after his father. He could end the war.  
  
“Azulon.... Ozai.... Iroh...” Longshot estimates, ticking down his fingers. “.... Azula.”  
  
Ah. The competition.  
  
“Azula isn’t in the palace,” Zuko reasons. “Besides, I’m the eldest. It’s my destiny to be the Fire Lord.”  
  
“Azulon, Ozai, Iroh,” Longshot says more directly.  
  
Oh, that was the point. Two powerful Fire Lords, and Uncle besides them. If he waits for them to die off, he won’t be Fire Lord until he’s forty — if he’s that lucky.  
  
“I’m going to assassinate the Fire Lord,” Zuko blurts out. He sucks in a breath, biting his lip as he waits for a reaction.  
  
Longshot nods benignly, thinking it through. “Guards, ships, servants, war tanks....” He lists the obstacles casually, stripping away Zuko’s plan with ruthless logic. Because even if they start a revolution, every citizen in the Fire Nation has fire in their soul, and who knows if the chefs and hearth sweepers won’t feel obligated to defend their ruler? They can’t fight an entire _nation_.  
  
If he backs down now, however, he won’t have the courage to try again.  
  
“I’m going back to my uncle,” Zuko says jaggedly, ignoring the sudden stiffness in Longshot’s posture. “I’m going to let him take me back to the palace. When he presents me to the Fire Lord, I’ll kill him.”  
  
Longshot’s eyebrows disappear under the brim of his hat. He picks at a thick blade of grass, tearing it strip by strip until there’s nothing left but leaf juice and pulp staining his fingers. “That’s not possible.”  
  
Finally it starts. “It doesn’t matter!” Zuko exclaims. “I’m tired of doing nothing. For years I followed Jet around, trying to help the war effort without killing anyone, and now I offer to murder my own grandfather and you want to stop me? What do you want me to — ”  
  
“Not stop,” Longshot interrupts, dissolving Zuko’s argument. (He never interrupts. That’s not how it works!) Looking up, Longshot uses more full sentences than Zuko’s ever heard at once. “Surrendering yourself is suicidal. We should ambush the Fire Lord at night, when the sun is gone. The guards won’t see us.”  
  
For the second time that morning, Zuko has to sit back and process. This isn’t how it’s supposed to go. He’s supposed to rant and Longshot is supposed to listen, and then he’ll go do what he wants and the archer will make sure he doesn’t get himself killed. (Or he'll tattle to Jet in some subtle gesture so Zuko isn’t doing stupid things alone.) Longshot doesn’t plot assassinations, or volunteer an alternate scheme. He follows the strongest voice, and Zuko was depending on that loyalty.  
  
Or was the strongest voice always Jet’s, Zuko realizes, and now Longshot felt free to make his own decision?  
  
He doesn’t know how to feel about that.  
  
“You’ll still help me, though?” Zuko says faintly, still trying to comprehend this twist on the person who's never once altered his own path. Never argued. Never changed.  
  
Longshot rotates his jaw, thinking it over. “Should Mom know?”  
  
“She isn't adopting you,” Zuko corrects, scowling. “And no; we can’t tell her. She’ll just try to stop me.”  
  
“Allies?” Longshot wonders.  
  
“No one we can trust. Uncle doesn’t need to know why he’s turning me in.”  
  
Sighing in that ‘ _you’re still delirious and talking nonsense’_ manner, Longshot proposes, “New plan. Non-suicidal.”  
  
“You want me to just go along with Mother and hide in Ba Sing Se?” Zuko retorts. “I’m done running, Longshot! I’m never hiding again.”  
  
“Not hide. Sneak,” Longshot suggests. “Uncle’s going home. Ships have cargo holds.”  
  
“Go back... without even telling him?” Zuko realizes. Stow away on his uncle’s own ship, hearing his voice day after day and knowing he can’t interact, even to tell Uncle he misses him? He could learn so much about Firebending on board, and he can’t even watch the soldiers run through their morning katas.  
  
“He has guards,” Zuko notes, reconsidering the sense of the plan.  
  
“Stooges.”  
  
“And servants.”  
  
Longshot just casts him a look for that one. _Is that really a threat?_  
  
“And I don’t want to hide. From my uncle.” Zuko ducks his chin, trying to ignore how feeble that sounds.  
  
Reaching out, Longshot pats his arm. “Not for long. We’ll leave him alive.”  
  
And just like that, Zuko realizes he’s accidentally hired the most devious assassin in the Earth Kingdom.  
  
He’s really glad he isn’t the Fire Lord yet.  
  


* * *

  
Jet looks less than thrilled when he cranes his neck to see the sky bison swoop down.  
  
“Well, look what the cat owl dragged in,” the Freedom Fighter drawls between sharp teeth.  
  
“I know this seems weird, but we want to join you,” Aang says hurriedly, holding out his hands for peace. Katara follows him warily, tugging on his sleeve until he notices the new girl. Bright colors and white teeth bared in a smile. She looks like a great person.  
  
“Aang, this is a really bad idea,” Katara whispers.  
  
“Yeah, I’m staying up here,” Sokka loudly agrees. “You guys get bored down there, I’ll call the yip-yip.”  
  
Appa lurches at the suggestion and sends his last passenger flying out of the saddle. Sokka’s yelp is muffled in a mouthful of dirt as he bounces, slides, and rolls to a halt at Jet’s feet. The Freedom Fighter swivels the piece of grass in his mouth and looks idly over his shoulder. “Bandit. Crush ‘em.”  
  
“Where did they come from?” the girl in green sputters. “What is that thing, anyways? Hello, we agreed on verbal cues before you sic’ me on something.”  
  
Jaw flexing as he bites a little too hard on the wheat stalk, Jet answers stiffly, “Big flying bison that just took the tops off a few hundred-year-old trees. Pipsqueak on the left, Waterbender by the furball. The clumsy stick thrower’s already down.”  
  
“It’s a boomerang!” Sokka spouts.  
  
“You had me at tree toppler,” Bandit says. Pounding one bare foot into the dust, she raises her hands as if plucking clay from the river. Earth swamps over Sokka, burying him up to the nose, before it swooshes up to catch up Katara. A quick step and Aang springs just above the avalanche, balancing precariously on the sifting dirt.  
  
“Stay still, Pipsqueak,” Bandit growls, clawing her hand back.  
  
Feet scrabbling, Aang skips away from the pawing earth and rides the miniature downslide, jumping away as another dusty whip snags at his ankle. “Wh-whoah! Hey, you guys didn’t tell me you had an Earthbender!”  
  
“We had a Firebender, too,” Jet grumbles, sidestepping when Aang tries to hide behind him. “Thanks for dropping in for a visit.”  
  
“We didn’t take Li away from you!” Katara yells, wriggling her shoulders to try and loosen the earth pinning her arms. “He chose to come with us!”  
  
“Yeah? Well, I’m _choosing_ to smush you,” Jet decides. “Guess that makes us even.”  
  
“Less talk, more pinning down twinkle toes here,” Bandit gripes, growling when Aang flutters just ahead of her. “Don’t make me do everything!”  
  
“Because you’re _so_ willing to volunteer,” Jet mutters.  
  
“What was that?”  
  
Smellerbee (also a passive viewer, Aang notices) slaps a hand to her face and groans. “If you run her off again I’m joining the hairy bison team.”  
  
“See? Smellerbee thinks it’s a great idea!” Aang exclaims. Too late, he realizes the “team bonding” proposal took his mind off Bandit. Shale slams into his back and crawls up his arms, molding into the ground beneath him like a crusty shell.  
  
“A-hah!” Bandit shouts. “Knew you couldn’t outrun me for long!”  
  
“Good work,” Jet says grudgingly. He crouches beside Sokka and tilts his head for a moment, considering. Smirking, he pulls the grass from his mouth and brushes the feathery grains against the teenager’s nose.  
  
“Don’t think you can — _ahh_ — _ahh_ — We’ll never — _ahhchoo!_ Knock it off!” Sokka yells.  
  
“I think it’s funny,” Jet says humorlessly.  
  
“Because you always bully people who can’t fight back, isn’t that right?” Katara snaps.  
  
Mirth vanishing, Jet rises and remouths the grass, staring hard at the Waterbender. “You shouldn’t have followed us,” he says. “I was content to forget that your little band existed. Now, I’m starting to think twice about the bounty they’re holding over you.”  
  
“You’re going to sell us out?” Sokka splutters.  
  
Jet shrugs. “Why not? You attacked us first. Giant monster... spinning stick.... Lucky for us we had an Earthbender on our team.”  
  
“I do _not_ believe this,” Sokka snaps. “We literally ask to toddle along with your little three-person band and you escalate it to an ambush. Typical Freedom Fighter.”  
  
“Actually, from what I’ve been told, you kidnapped one of our members,” Bandit pitches in.  
  
“For the last time, it was not a kidnapping!” Sokka yowls. “He literally was riding our bison! And he wouldn’t get off! If anything, Zuko kidnapped Appa!”  
  
Aang doesn’t know what was said, but Jet’s face washes white and suddenly he has a hook sword in one hand and a curved blade in the other.  
  
“What did you call him?” the leader rasps.  
  
“Zuko,” Sokka says tartly. “As in the Fire Lord’s mopey, blanket-cuddling, moon-loving little princely....“ Eyes rapidly darting to take in the three faces in his vision, he mumbles, “Aaand you probably didn’t know any of that.”  
  
“Wait, you really did have a Firebender?” Bandit clarifies. “I thought you guys hated the Fire Nation.”  
  
“ _Li_ was different,” Jet says, stressing the name. “The Fire Nation cast him out. We gave him a home.”  
  
“Until you ruined it,” Smellerbee accuses, glaring at Aang.  
  
“Look, we didn’t mean to separate your team,” Aang says reasonably. “Li was going to teach me Firebending. I have to master Fire and Earth if I’m going to beat the Fire Lord.”  
  
“Hah!” Bandit's laugh is sharp and shrill, like she’s simpering over a private joke.  
  
“I really need to learn Earthbending first,” Aang says. “We could team up! We’ll help you find Li, and in exchange, Bandit can teach me Earthbending. You’ll cover ground much faster with Appa!”  
  
“You’re avoiding the question,” Jet says darkly. “Who is Zuko?”  
  
Bandit tilts her head and shifts her feet, confusion flitting across her expression. “Who is Zuko to you,” she clarifies. “I’ve never heard the name before.”  
  
“ _You_ have,” Aang says thickly, his voice softening as he watches Jet. Raw fear glints in the leader’s eyes for an instant before it’s smoothed away. “How did Li... how did _Zuko_ find you?”  
  
Grimness settles like an old cloak; the shroud of stale hatred. “He didn’t find us,” Jet answers briefly. “We sheltered him. The Fire Nation sent patrols to kill him. We renamed him Li. That’s all there is.”  
  
“But the Fire Nation’s trying to get him back right now!” Aang warns.  
  
“We know,” Jet says, his voice strangled into a growl. “Why do you think we’re this far inland?”  
  
“So let us help you!” Aang compels him. “Appa’s faster than any patrol. We'll get Li back for you, and then Bandit can teach me Earthbending. It’s a fair exchange.”  
  
“My kids aren’t wares for you to barter with!” Jet refutes. “We find Li; we keep Bandit.”  
  
“It’s the Blind Bandit. Get it right,” the girl drawls.  
  
“Look, we all have a common interest here,” Katara says, attempting a cheerful tone. “We just want to save Li. Why can’t we work together?”  
  
“Finders keepers,” Jet states.  
  
“He’s right — you’ll just kidnap him again,” Smellerbee agrees.  
  
Sokka gnashes his teeth. “For the last time, it wasn’t —“  
  
“Heard you the first time, Ponytail,” Jet says.  
  
“Hang on, this is interesting,” Bandit says brightly. “It’s like a race. So how about a little wager? You find Zuko-Li first, and I’ll teach you Earthbending — if you can wrap your airy head around it.”  
  
“That sounds vaguely disparaging,” Sokka says, narrowing his eyes suspiciously.  
  
“If we find Li first, you forfeit all rights to him,” Bandit establishes. “That means no more chasing us, no whining about finding another Firebending teacher, no crying to make him change his mind.”  
  
“Really?” Sokka deadpans. “You’d think we ran him off with the way she talks.”  
  
“Stuff it, Sneezles!”  
  
“Okay, okay, we accept,” Aang says eagerly.  
  
“We do not accept!” Jet argues.  
  
“Wait, I wasn’t finished!” Aang pleads. “If we find Li first, I get to learn Firebending _and_ Earthbending, and then both your team members can go back to being Freedom Fighters. Either way you get your Firebender back!”  
  
Jet frowns, eyebrows fidgeting spasmodically, until Smellerbee elbows him. “It’s a reasonable trade, Jet. Besides, we’ll just pick Li up when they lose him again.”  
  
“We did not lose him! He was kidnapped!” Sokka states.  
  
Jet smirks. “Finally, something we agree on.”  
  
Eyes fairly crossed with consternation, Sokka thinks it over and then spouts, “By _Earthbenders!_ Evil Fire Nation loving Earthbenders at a perfectly secure outpost!”  
  
“Yeah, you made your point the first time,” Jet scoffs. He resheathes his mismatched swords, already turning to continue west. “Wager accepted. We’ll see you on the tailwinds.”  
  
“That’s right,” Sokka says brashly, “Eat our sky dust when we — hey wait, you forgot to let us out!”  
  
“Lesson one in Earthbending,” Bandit says, swiveling long enough to grin at Aang. “Be the rock. I’m sure you’ll figure out how to dig yourself out.”  
  
“That’s not fair! You’ll get a head start!” Aang protests.  
  
“You have a flying bison,” Jet snarks. “Catch up.”  
  
The Freedom Fighters walk away, leaving Katara cursing as she wriggles, and Sokka going cross-eyed as a bug crawls over his nose. Aang shakes his head, the only free part of his body, and yowls, “Be the rock? What’s that supposed to mean? How is that supposed to get us out of here?”  
  
“You’ll figure it out!” Bandit solaces.  
  
They’re left to themselves, skin crawling and limbs cramping, until the sun sinks below the hills and glowflies welcome the dusk. When the sun finally sets, Aang slumps down and rests his cheek in the dirt.  
  
“We’re never going to get out of here.”  
  
  



	29. Absolution

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> During the fight with the Earthbenders, Zuko is injured by Iroh's miscalculation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: VERY DARK. Graphic Descriptions of Injury and bad medical advice. (Happy ending, though)

For one negligent moment Iroh does not look for Zuko’s blind spot. By the time he realizes his folly the prince is suddenly in front of him, bracing his stance to defend them both, and before Iroh can shout to warn him the young man is caught in the path of the chain arching towards the Earthbender captain. Metal clangs against bone, wrapping once, hurling Zuko off his feet before the stone rackets free and he is cast to the earth.   
  


The fight is over in minutes after that. Earthbenders lie heaped in pyres of fire and stone, but the cost of victory is more than Iroh can stomach.

He runs to his nephew, crouching beside him and pulling his hands down from his face Zuko retaliates by pulling his knees up to his chest, as though somehow he can cover the pain and disappear from it. His eyes are already dull and lost, magnified by pain too great to voice.

He does not scream.

“Zuko, you must let me examine it,” Iroh pleads. Immediately the boy paws him away, his eyes flickering distantly as if he does not know his own family. Panting cries crack from his throat, sharp and quick like a small fox dragging a hunter’s trap. Iroh has seen him this way only once before; when the burn was first tended. 

He vowed he would never let such calamity befall his nephew again.

“I know the pain is excruciating,” Iroh says, gently pulling the boy’s hands away. “Trust me, Zuko. I will not hurt you.”

Cognizance sharpens enough to pierce an old man’s heart, for the flash in golden eyes tells him that Zuko knows _exactly_ how he was injured. Looping purple imprints are already settling in across slopes of uneven bone. He is fortunate the stone released from its tether, and the chain did not break his neck, but the damage is beyond any wound Iroh tended in his days of war.

He will not spare himself the guilt for anything that comes of this. He should have looked for Zuko’s blind spot.

The lightest brush from Iroh’s fingertips, and Zuko jerks back with a muffled howl. Movement exasperated the wound as he scrabbles, clawing dirt under his nails until they bleed, before the pain settles back into its threshold.

Zuko has fought and survived and endured many things, but Iroh has brought him to this.

“Forgive me, Zuko,” Iroh pleads, bracing the boy’s shoulder with one hand, and settling the other on his misshapen jaw.

A shriek peals past broken teeth, spilling over lips that are split in some places, crushed in others. Iroh snatches back instantly, soothing his nephew when tears of betrayal spill. He does not need to examine further to know that the journey back will be torturous, and if he does not move quickly, shock may draw Zuko beyond a physician’s aide. 

“I must bind it,” Iroh warns, despair husking his voice. Zuko’s gaze latches onto him, begging for mercy, and he must turn his eyes away.

He takes a sash from one of the Earth soldiers. It’s not as soft as silk, but he is ... unfortunately lacking in spare clothing, and it is grim justice to ease his nephew’s suffering with spoils taken from the enemy.

When he turns around, Zuko is inches from where he saw him last, pushing desperately at the earth to move himself further away. Iroh’s heart splits in two, both for his nephew’s anguish, and for the torture he must inflict upon him. There will be time for tears later; for now he beats upon his grieving soul and approaches, hardening himself against the panic that clings to Zuko’s eyes.

“Forgive me,” Iroh murmurs, and he moves at once.

He does not let himself look past his actions and forget, as he would for a young soldier on the battlefield. Such pain is necessary, but this Iroh has inflicted himself, and he will force himself to recall every instant in the nights to come, until he has paid the price for his negligence. 

Bone shifts under his hands and he works deftly, ignoring sharp cries and nails clawing at his wrists. Flailing boots gather more dust and Zuko grabs Iroh’s hand and twists, as if to avenge his pain on the administrator. Streams on nonsensical comfort wash over the boy as Iroh pulls the sash cruelly tight, binding his jaw in place. By the time he is finished, Zuko is unconscious. It’s the first good thing that has come from this disaster.

They are too far from the ship for Iroh to carry his nephew, and he does not like how the welts wrap around the back of his skull. (The stone released, but not before the chain clinched tight. Iroh lurched to stop it and his fingers grasped helplessly as Zuko fell, soundless —) He cannot reminisce now. He must take his nephew to a proper physician. 

An ostrich horse is easily appropriated, and the saddle is cushioned with the soldiers’ garments. Let them ride naked in the bare sun, as they forced upon their prisoner. Iroh lifts the boy to the saddle and climbs quickly after him, leaning him back against the natural cushioning of his stomach. Zuko groans but does not wake; another kindness.

The journey is too long.

The first time nausea makes itself known, Zuko nearly chokes, and the bandage is ruined. Iroh replaces it with the prince’s silk belt and starts watching for the signs, stopping when necessary to loosen the bindings and brace Zuko’s head as bile slips between his teeth. The spasms are always enough to drive the prince back into the dark. He rouses only on occasion, moaning into Iroh’s chest, tears dampening his tunic. Iroh murmurs reassurances, tempted to pinch the boy’s nostrils until unconsciousness is forced. He breathes easier when Zuko’s limbs fall lax again.

Lieutenant Jee sees them from afar. Thank Agni he is more assertive than Zhao’s lackeys. Even in the dusk the officer knows something is wrong.

“Kohaku is preparing a bed,” Jee murmurs, reaching up to ease Zuko from the saddle.

“Be gentle,” Iroh snaps. “He is unconscious — for now.”

Zuko still keens as he is passed down. His eyelids part for a moment, and Jee flinches as if he will drop the prince in his horror.

“Who did this?” he asks, his eyes promising vengeance.

Iroh looks towards the ship, biting down his shame. “I did.”

(He did not look for Zuko’s blind spot. His neck could have snapped; his jaw torn asunder; his skull crushed by the stone....)

“General, you’re not well,” Jee cautions, signaling another guard to catch Iroh as he sways. “Get the general inside! He may be injured.”

“No... no, only Zuko,” Iroh answers. He is cold, dread numbing the fires within. “I will accompany him.”

He follows Jee to the physician’s quarters. Although the lieutenant is steady on his feet and the ship is docked, Zuko stirs from the jostling and arches, shoving weakly at the arms that cradle him. Iroh has never seen his lieutenant more dismayed by his own strength. He is hasty to deposit the prince onto the waiting bunk and step aside, lingering for the physician’s diagnosis.

Kohaku looks on from the door he’s holding ajar, whitewashed and cursing fluidly in southern dock slang. He looks helplessly at the roll of bandages in his hand and shakes his head at Iroh. 

“Stay out of the room for a few hours. You’re not going to like this.”

Iroh will not be moved, and he will not close his eyes to the cruelty he has dealt. He watches the guards hold his nephew down when pain tears apart the blissful shroud of ether. He holds Zuko’s hand, clenching fingers bruising his own, when Kohaku saws and manipulates and fits pieces of bone back together. He snaps orders at the guards, to wipe the physician’s brow or adjust their stances so that Zuko is not bruised as well as mauled from hours of pressure. He does not look away from the blood, or the tears, or the accusation in golden eyes as he forces his nephew to endure that which would cripple a warrior.

When it is over, the room is warm from the afternoon sun. Kohaku’s hands shake from too many hours of fine cuts, and his face is shaded from a flailing fist. He wipes blood from his hands and passes the cloth to Iroh — only then does Iroh realize his own hands are filthy with it.

“He isn’t moving for at least a week,” Kohaku says, managing to grouch like an admiral in spite of fatigue. “ _No. Moving_. No talking, no sitting up, no turning without assistance. I want someone posted in here every minute. He’s got a concussion as well as a shattered jaw, so send me somebody who won’t get squeamish over vomit. Preferably, I want a team in here. He’s a handful even when he’s lucid, and I don’t know how cognizant he’ll be when he wakes up.”

“I understand,” Iroh says tonelessly. He stares at the monstrosity of white bandages and hardened clay that cups his nephew’s head from nose to collarbone. Kohaku follows his gaze and shrugs.

“Immobility is essential. He’ll start wiggling pieces out of place otherwise. Try to convince him not to poke around with his tongue when he starts getting surly. I'm really hoping we don't have to pull tooth shards yet. I left room for him to breathe and take liquids, but we’re going to have to talk about that — and I need to rig something first so he doesn’t get the bandages damp.”

“Isn’t there a better method?” Jun asks. Her posture is that of a statue — impossible to discern — but her face takes on that queasy, withdrawn look that Iroh sees only in the hours before battle. (Or in that indecent time of the month when women should not be approached for conversation.)

Kohaku sighs tersely. “What do you think this is, a Water Tribe boat? I don’t have any spirit water! I can’t wrap stone around it — I don’t even know _how_ Earthbenders treat broken bones — and this is the best I can do to make sure he’s capable of running his mouth sometime in the future.”

“But he will heal?” Iroh prods. 

“Don’t ask me too many questions,” Kohaku snaps. “I told you, I won’t know everything until it’s safe for him to work it, and I don’t have the proper tools to work miracles on this dingy. We’ll just have to wait for the swelling to go down a little more.... maybe I can operate again.”

Zuko will not like that. Iroh isn’t sure if he can stand by while they hold his nephew down again. (He must. It is his fault that such calamity has befallen him.)

“Usual report to the Fire Lord?” Kohaku says resignedly, leaning against the small table that makes up his work space.

There hasn’t been any word from Ozai since the exile began. One more instance will not change this.

“We will wait for further developments,” Iroh says. “I will take the first watch over my nephew.”

“No, you’re going to drink tea and get some shuteye,” Kohaku states. Before Iroh can even glower properly the physician retorts, “My surgery, my rules! You agreed to that before I signed onto this suicidal street squad. Go. Play dead for a few hours. Put some weight back on your bones. And for Tui’s sake, put on some clothes!”

Iroh draws himself to his full, royal height and waits for the physician to apologize for his misstep. Kohaku raises one eyebrow, half asleep on his feet and still making a mockery of his superiors. 

“Honestly, if you think you’re going to sit in my surgery in a loincloth and a bathrobe all day, then we’re going to have a group discussion about hygiene and why you don’t bring your personal germs near sick people. _Out_. Or I’m calling Jee to come get you.”

“General, if we stay here he’ll just start waiving his contract again,” Jun advises patiently. “You know Tarou’s just waiting for you to burn that thing so he can skip out on the physical evaluations.”

Kohaku grins, Poleshark white teeth in a feral grin, and Iroh curses his brother for forcing them to assemble their own crew. Perhaps the dockside wayfarer is better at improvisation than some of the palace physicians, but his admiration for authority is grievously lacking. Lieutenant Jee indulges him too much.

“You will inform me of his condition in two hours,” Iroh instructs.

“I’ll be sleeping in two hours,” Kohaku answers. “Get your lackeys to do it. Now _get_.”

Iroh does not “get.” He calmly walks out of his own accord. 

“Inform me of Prince Zuko’s condition in two hours,” he commands Jun. 

“Understood, Sir.”

She does not wake him to fulfill her orders. She leaves a note.

* * *

Zuko lurches to awareness too quickly, and becomes a handful for the crew. He cannot escape from the misery in his head, and must be held down so that he won’t thrash or crawl under the bed. He keens ceaselessly, unaware of the noise, dazed eyes roving sightlessly until he slips under again. 

Kohaku starts burning incense that smells like heady flowers and mint, instead of his usual juniper and spruce. He conscripts Deming to make a thin, long spouted contraption, much like a shallow teapot or an odd lamp, that can pour lukewarm broth into the prince’s mouth by sips instead of choking him. He murmurs endless streams of useless drivel, distracting Zuko when the boy is turned or the soaked sheets replaced, and Iroh thanks the Spirits that they hired on such an unpretentious heathen. Zuko is calmer when the healer is around, and more apt to listen when he is told to lie still, drink slowly, don’t fight against the hands that are there to help.

There are bedcloths drenched by sweat and vomit and more unpleasant things. There are nights when Iroh must hold Zuko still as he wails past the clay binding his teeth in place. There are days when Jee yells at his crew, and Tarao weeps, and Kohaku chucks a teacup out the porthole because the contents were cold. Jun leaves her post one day, and Chenguang finds her in a corner beneath the staircase, shivering and whispering prayers.

Nearly a week passes, and Iroh seeks a favorable report from Kohaku. The physician meets him in the doorway before he can enter, brandishing a cold candle.

“We have a new development,” Kohaku says, and Iroh knows there is nothing but ill news.

“Very well,” Iroh says, bracing himself for one more reminder that Zuko will never be himself again. 

Kohaku jabs the candle in his face. “Light me.”

He rolls his eyes when Iroh turns down his nose. “You know I’m physically incapable of producing a flame. I accidentally threw out my flint. Darn thing wasn’t doing me any good anyways, and there’s no point in a stove if there’s five or six Benders breathing in there all the time, kid’s gonna sweat out a fever just by the force of body heat in that room.....” Shaking himself out of his ramble, Kohaku thrusts the candle into Iroh’s hand. “I mislaid my spark maker. Gimme a light, then come inside. There’s something I need to check.”

The idleness vanishes from his tone, and his gaze only holds ill boding. Iroh loiters in cupping a flame, for something tells him he will soon wish for the simpler nightmares of the night before.

As soon as the candle flickers Kohaku grabs it and holds the door open, nodding inside. “We’re alone. I sent the others to breakfast.”

Iroh does not want to hear anything further. He enters the room that smells of lavender and chamomile and sick, and is crushed anew by the wasting figure barricaded amongst pillows and blankets. Kohaku scuffs his feet and crouches by the bed, fussing with the blankets.

“I brought old man grouchy-pants with me. He’s going to sit with you for a while. I made him promise not to spout proverbs or stupid lady’s fables while he’s in here. I gotta round up Tarou and put him on laundry detail, the lil' shirker. Your uncle’s duds? They stink. One of these days Jee’s going to set the wrong foot in my infirmary and I’m gonna set him up with a washerboard. Love to hear him cursing about soapsuds.”

The candle roves in front of Zuko’s face during the entire litany, too far away for him to feel the heat. He breathes evenly, glassy stare fixed just to Kohaku’s left, shoulders trembling. Kohaku looks deliberately at Iroh before wetting his fingers and extinguishing the flame.

There’s a reason the man threw out his precious flint.

“Me and Uncle are going to have a chat later,” Kohaku says calmly, pressing lightly on the mattress before he stands. “No solids for a while, but I’m going to regulate what kind of tea he forces on you. Flower water is just nasty.”

Zuko’s eyes do not shift. He breathes wetly, lost in a haze of soporifics that don’t dull anything enough, and closes his eyes when Kohaku taps his shoulder.

It’s a code, silently conspired the moment the physician suspected, and he said _nothing_.

“I will speak to you more later,” Iroh says grimly.

Kohaku shrugs. He’s either too confident, or too bone-tired to care if they ditch him at the next port. “I need tea,” he grumbles. He weaves past Iroh and pauses in the hallway, staring dimly at the candle in his hand. Spewing an oath, he chucks it down the hall and tromps off, stamping on the wax cylinder when it rolls his way.

Iroh looks at his nephew and wants to close his eyes and never open them again. This should be his curse; a blight from Agni upon blind old fools. Hasn’t Zuko lost enough? The young should not reach out for their elders to help them. Zuko is not even a man, and already the path before him is dark — in spirit before, and now also in sight.

Shutting the door with a soft click, Iroh emulates the physician’s stride, allowing his steps to drag just enough so that Zuko will know where he is. He sits down heavily and takes his nephew’s hand. Trembling fingers grip fiercely, and silent tears spring from beneath closed lids. Whatever is on Zuko’s mind cannot be voiced. Iroh is but a companion in his solitude. One who can solace, but not understand. One who can sympathize, but not heal. One who can bring comfort, but not light.

What little he can offer, Iroh vows to provide until his dying day. He strokes his nephew’s hand with his thumb and forces merriment into his voice, as though he knows nothing of the prince’s malady. 

“Our physician, I am sure, has delighted in regaling you with anecdotes of the dragonfly bunny spirits of the Air Nomad legends. I am here to reassure you, they are quite real, and your great-great-grandfather was once attacked by a colony of them.....”

* * *

“It might not be permanent,” Kohaku explains the moment he closes the door to Iroh’s quarters. “I can’t say anything for sure right now, but it may be only temporary. There’s a lot of swelling on the back of his head.”

“How long have you suspected?” Iroh challenges.

“Four days,” Kohaku answers shamelessly. “He stopped eye-telegraphing everything. He’s scared half to death and he couldn’t tell anybody. I was hoping it was just a misdirect from the head blow, or disassociation due to the pain. I took measures in case.”

“You did not see fit to inform me?” Iroh censures. Blind. Cut off from the world, silent and sightless, with only the voices around him and contact that promises more pain. How much more can a young man endure?

“What did you want to hear?” Kohaku retorts. “You wouldn’t leave the room as it was! I couldn’t get you to eat outside his room, let alone bathe! Or sleep! As far as I knew you’d lay a mat on the floor and leave the ship to run itself. I don’t need two patients here to worry about! So no, I wasn’t going to say anything until I knew for sure.”

“This is my nephew of which you speak, and your prince,” Iroh warns.

“Not my prince,” Kohaku says brazenly. “My _charge_ , because I choose to care about the nutty fanatics that romp around this ship. But don’t you pull that Fire Nation propaganda around me!”

Blue meets gold and Iroh knows that he can give the order and the ship will no longer require a physician. Kohaku is well aware of his tenuous position. He makes himself scarce whenever Zhao approaches the ship, and the crew expects him to vanish before they return to volcanic soil. He owes no loyalty to the Fire Nation, and they owe him no mercy on board their ship.

Just as the healer remains devoted to his charges, however, Iroh determines to keep him around — at least until they reach the next port. There is plenty of time to throw him in the brig before then.

“I expect to be fully informed of the prince’s condition from now on,” Iroh states. “You will report directly to me with any changes or improvements.”

Kohaku starts to speak, bites his lip, shuffles his feet, and finally proposes, “He could use a Waterbending healer.”

The infernal man does like to challenge his own survival.

“And where would you propose I pursue this fabled legend?” Iroh says, although he is well aware of the treasonous suggestion.

“Up north,” Kohaku says. “Kid can’t go back to the Fire Nation like this. He’s dead either way. You can offer them a truce to fix him up.”

“And make him twice the traitor to the Fire Nation,” Iroh surmises.

“It’s a blind traitor or a fully functioning traitor without a home,” Kohaku says bluntly. “Kid can’t make that choice on his own right now. I’m sorry, but he isn’t up to handling his own basic bodily functions, let alone answering for his future. You have to make that decision.... Prince Iroh.”

It’s an invocation. A challenge to the rank Iroh bequeathed to Zuko during their journey, hoping the responsibility towards the crew would teach his nephew lessons beyond the crown. Though he pampered Zuko’s ideals, the crew has always answered to a higher rank.

Now, there is only one commander fit for duty. 

“It cannot be done,” Iroh says. He shakes his head ruthlessly when Kohaku gapes. He may have forced this blight upon his nephew, but he will not turn him into an enemy of his father. “The wind cannot choose the nest of a sparrow. Zuko must determine his own destiny.”

“You’re crazy,” Kohaku breathes. “You — you’re all crazy! There’s no honor in the life of a beggar! There’s no post in the Fire Nation that’ll take him if he’s blind! There’s a chance this could still be reversed. What if the wound heals on its own and it’s permanent?”

“You will leave that for my nephew to decide.” This time, there is no room for argument. Iroh leaves no doubt as to the consequences if the physician flaunts his command.

Kohaku snarls, bright teeth and savage eyes. “If this ruins him, I want off this ship,” he threatens. “I’ve never lost any of your soldiers, and I’m not going to watch that kid bumble around just because you refused to do anything!”

“You are dismissed, Kohaku,” Iroh orders. 

“Yeah, I’ll go,” the physician snaps. “If anyone needs me tell them I’m having a mental breakdown in the lower decks! And next time you want to talk to me send somebody else to take a message!”

He slams the door behind him, loud enough to rattle three decks, and stamps in the direction of the boiler room. Tarao has reported him pacing and ranting to the coal sweepers from time to time.

Grim exterior slumping, Iroh buries his face in his hands. One moment of misfortune, and all that lies before Zuko is briars and thorns. Whichever path he chooses, he will lose.

Iroh will not abandon him to walk that path alone. Even if he never sets foot in his homeland again, he will protect the son that Ozai forsook. He will not fail the boy again. 

* * *

The crew is made aware of the prince’s misfortune, and tempers are higher now than the very first week when a band of misfits were pent in together on a small iron crate. Helplessness and uncertainty drives many of the arguments. Iroh intervenes when necessary, sparing Jee from losing his own wavering semblance of control. Kohaku guards his surgery like a war hawk, paring down the sudden rush of helpers to two inside the room at a time, or sometimes no one but himself if he thinks Zuko is panicking from the lack of privacy. It does an old man’s heart good to see so many stoic soldiers melt into storytellers and poets when they enter the prince’s sickroom, where words alone can distract him and lend meaning to the sudden void in his senses. 

  
They develop a crude system once Zuko is coherent enough to follow a sentence. His hand is guided to a palm; one tap for yes, two for no. (Or three or seven, depending on how emphatically he wants to prove that he doesn’t want to even think about listening in on music night at this time.) The constant blushing and pretenses of sleep speak for how badly he’s coping with his sudden helplessness, but there is little Kohaku can rig for a boy who is meant to keep as still as possible. Without his sight, he cannot even slide the tiles on a Pai Sho board.

The crew finds creative ways to occupy his mind. Jee starts bringing in reports, sitting on the floor against the bed to read them aloud, where Zuko can bat his shoulder in disapproval or ceaselessly staccato a finger if he wants to be irritating. (Jee is a very patient man.) Huang scrounges his chest of scrap fabric and "consults" Zuko on the textures, gossiping about his sisters’ talents in the tailoring industry and how he’s going to sneak a few more furls into Jee’s tunic with every patch job until the man greets Admiral Zhao in a lovely skirt. (It’s unfair to make Zuko laugh, they realize quickly.) Jun merely sits, giving Zuko his quiet shift, presence alone reassuring him that he only needs to nudge her for a brief questionnaire to establish his needs. Deming starts working on a system of shaped metal tiles, in hopes that they can offer a more complex language system for the duration of the jaw brace.

Despite the hopes of recovery, it’s not yet two weeks after the injury when broken wails drag Iroh from an ill dream moments before Kohaku barges into the room, wild and wet-eyed and furious.

“I need to change the plaster,” he says rapidly. “He broke it off and he’s going into shock. Deming‘s in there, but I need you!”

Iroh leaps to his feet, already clad in the uniform he slept in, and runs after the physician. The screams grow louder, heart wrenching sobs of anguish, and he enters a room of terror where three of the crew are trying to pin thrashing limbs. He sees Zuko’s face and his legs feel weak. Knobs of irregular bone jab from purple flesh, braided together with lines of splitting stitches. Blood streams from the prince’s mouth. He can scarcely breathe between cries, sightless eyes rolling in torment.

“Hold his head! Don’t touch his face! Get me the ether!” Kohaku shouts, dragging a fourth guard into the surgery.

Once more Iroh is forced to pin his nephew down, baring him to the torture of knife and needle as Kohaku rearranges his grisly first attempt. The ether forces Zuko into a haze, but he twitches and whimpers through hours of surgery. When it is finished, and the clay is hard enough that they can release their charge, Kohaku pulls himself up to sit on his work table and barks at the soldiers to leave the room.

“He’s going to die,” he informs Iroh bitterly. “He’s going to starve to death, or get an infection, or just stop breathing the next time we have to plaster — I can’t keep him going under this kind of pain! He’s a kid trying to cope with an injury that would kill a grown man. You might as well say goodbye here, because if he tears that bandage off again the shock alone will destroy him!”

“I know this,” Iroh begins to say.

“You’re all maniacs!” Kohaku rants. “What kind of nation forces their children to die with honor rather than asking for help? You have warships and tanks and multitudes of soldiers and there isn’t a scrap of compassion in your bloodless souls!”

“What I’m trying to say, is —“

“You won’t even save your own family! You know what I heard? General Iroh sent his son to die for a wall. I didn’t put stock in it because you were _so_ generous to your nephew, but now I’m starting to think —“

“Enough!” Iroh roars. 

“I’ve had enough!” Kohaku yells, lunging to his feet to stand toe-to-toe with the general. “I bathed that kid and forced broth on him and bandaged him up twice and I’m not going to watch him dwindle away on a sickbed! I’ve told you what ought to be done —“

“And I accept your proposition.”

“— And I’m not going to wring my hands while some pinch-faced lout.....” Heaving for breath, Kohaku trails off and stares, uncertainty trailing into his anger. “Say that again?”

“I will send for a healer from the Northern Water Tribe.” It is no longer a sacrifice that Iroh can avoid to salvage his nephew’s dignity. He will not lose a second son. “They are your people. Take what you wish from the treasury as trade, and bring back one experienced in such injuries. You will travel faster alone. We will continue on to meet you there.”

“Kid’s gonna be bad off without me,” Kohaku says faintly. “He’s gotta be turned every hour, fed every time he’s awake, no hot liquids, keep him dry, don’t let him touch the bandages again, make sure —“

“Write us a list,” Iroh instructs. “I think the crew has observed you enough in the last two weeks to comply.”

Kohaku breathes slower, but his mouth quirks in a sardonic grimace. “Northern Polesharks don’t like baubles,” he quips. “Bribery means nothing in a war.”

“What shall we offer them?” Iroh prompts.

Kohaku opens his mouth, thinks again, and then plows ahead. “Give me your topknot.” 

When Iroh hesitates, the physician insists, “Honor is the last thing a Brander will sacrifice. If you really want them to help, prove that you’re willing to make a truce with your enemies. That’s the only thing they’ll accept.”

Somberly, Iroh holds out his hand. “Give me your knife.”

The thin blade is still stained with Zuko’s blood. Swiftly Iroh takes it and slices close to his scalp, surrendering the bundle of fine grey hair into Kohaku’s palm.

“Leave quickly,” he instructs. “We will meet you along the way.”

“I need five minutes — and the tugboat,” Kohaku says grimly.

“Done.”

Kohaku nods crisply and whirls around, bloody fingers already scribbling instructions. “Keep smoking lavender and chamomile, it keeps him calm. There’s herbs for him to drink in tea — Jun knows which ones. If I keep the coal burning hot I can reach the North Pole in four days. Do _not_ waste my trip.”

He slaps the list into Iroh’s chest and runs, topknot clenched in a sweaty fist.

Iroh takes his seat at Zuko’s side, cradling the hand that has deteriorated to scabbed nails and bone in the short duration of his illness. Zuko shudders, eyelids flickering, too drugged to respond and too hypersensitive to sleep. How Iroh longs for that one day to fall back into; to heed his nephew’s irrational scolding and return to the ship before catastrophe waylaid them both. He would give anything to listen to Zuko complain about hot springs and wasted time.

“In every way, I have failed you,” Iroh says, resting his hand lightly on the scar. The heat burns into his palm. “Forgive me this last betrayal. I would trade honor, life and spirit to protect you.”

Zuko is young. He will not understand the grief of a father, or the fear of seeing that loss repeated in another son. One day, when he is old enough to view the world as a warrior and not a rebel, he will understand the sacrifices made on his behalf.

Until then, Iroh must choose for him, and shoulder the prince’s dismay and revulsion. He will do so gladly, if it will only return his nephew in one piece.

He would surrender the Fire Nation itself to have Zuko stand beside him once more.

* * *

Iroh stands before his crew without explanation or apology. Furtive gazes flinch away from his shorn head, but nothing is spoken.

“We will adjust our heading to the North Pole,” Iroh informs them. “If the Water Tribe benevolent, they will lend their aid to Prince Zuko.”

“Kohaku borrowed the skimmer last night,” Jee acknowledges gravely. “We’d better make up for lost time.”

The Fire Nation has never seen a finer crew.

* * *

Four hours into Kohaku’s departure, Iroh considers writing to the Fire Lord and demanding the incorporation of foreign healers into their navy. Zuko is unmanageable, flailing and scratching and socking weakly, trying to take out his pain on someone else. They are forced to tie him down, and then no one wants to leave his side; not without a kind word and a prayer that unconsciousness will find him quickly. The soft crying is too much. He is a free spirit bound in darkness, and no amount of soothing will seep through his bewildered fright. 

Iroh snatches at sleep, his back aching from hours spent in an uncomfortable chair. He does not let go of Zuko’s hand. Cries become feeble, delirious moans, and hot blood cools into clammy skin. They pour tea down the prince’s throat in the scant moments when he seems capable of swallowing without choking. (They dare not repeat that catastrophe.) Jun warms blankets by the hour to drape over the prince. It seems to comfort him, and Iroh dreads the state of his internal flame. 

The crew stops their bantering entirely, stony visages and sharp tempers dominating the upper levels. Such pleasant gaieties as music night and market excursions are dreams of a foreign past. (Iroh shudders to think of a tsungi horn, and broken lips and teeth trying to muster the strength to blow.) Certain members of the crew begin to linger near the sickroom, even when their services are not required.

Jee spends most of his time watching in the hours when Iroh nods off.

“There’s frost in the water barrels,” he comments one day, resignation staling his voice. “Any day now.”

He has given up on Kohaku returning in time, Iroh reads. The physician might have been waylaid, or rebuffed by his sister tribe, or captured by an enemy scout ship. Earth Kingdom or Fire Nation does not matter — both would find sport in running down a lone skiff. 

“We will continue on,” Iroh says tonelessly. “He would know best how to navigate these waters.”

The next morning, Hui scampers down the staircase to deliver the news. They’ve spotted a wooden boat.

Taking the spyglass from Kun, Iroh squints at the unornamented vessel that seems to advance far more quickly than is warranted for its build. He makes out a small figure at the prow, recognizable only by the undignified flurry of waggling arms. 

“He’s returned,” Iroh breathes.

“With all his limbs attached,” Jee acknowledges. “Pity.”

“Bring the prince onto the deck,” Iroh orders. “We will not veil our intentions behind gates of iron.”

“If it is a trap.... General?” Jee poses.

If it is a ruse to assassinate the Fire Lord’s son, the Water tribesmen need not bother. The boy is emaciated, hollow-eyed from constant torment and all but mute from screaming. Death will be an act of mercy.

”You have your orders, Lieutenant,” Iroh says.

By the time the small rig pulls alongside (up close they can see the Waterbender release the tides that speed the craft along), the guards have brought up Kohaku’s tools and anything that looks useful in the surgery. They carry Zuko in his bunk, and Iroh can see them cringe every time it’s jostled. These soldiers would shame the Fire Lord. He chose his crew wisely.

“Back away,” Kohaku orders, leaping onto the ship with an acrobat’s grace and shooing the helpers aside. He crouches by Zuko and gives him a quick glance-over, instantly grimacing. A look of panicked dread assaults the elder in blue who calmly, warily crosses onto the iron ship. “Can you do anything for him?”

“Stand aside, Lohaku,” the Waterbender instructs. His voice is low and gruff, emulating a leader who expects compliance. Kohaku scrambles back with more reverence than he’s shown to any member of the crew.

“Shouldn’t we correct him about Kohaku’s name?” Tarou whispers indiscreetly. 

“Shut up or I’m sewing your lips together,” Kohaku mumbles. He folds his arms stiffly as he watches the Waterbender approach.

Blue eyes are shrewd and impartial. Slowly, watching Iroh’s response, the Waterbender crouches by the prince and trickles water to his palm, hovering it across his body. 

“My nephew,” Iroh says by compulsion, for it must be known. “The accident took place twenty-two days ago. It has not healed.”

“And small wonder,” the Waterbender castigates. “You think you can force healing with mud, like an Earthbender? Sweating him out in a dark room on a roiling ocean?”

Ducking his head, Kohaku kicks out one foot, chastised and repentant as a small school child. “Sorry, Chief,” he mumbles.

“It’s as if you’ve forgotten everything of your people,” the man scolds. “Fire does not unite the body, or coals soothe the skin!”

“Hey, you Northies teach your women to heal!” Kohaku snaps, flushing three darker than his tan. “Why’d you volunteer?”

“I regret the unlearned practices of our ship’s physician,” Iroh quickly intercedes, glowering at Kohaku for silence. “He is trained in practices from the mainland, and would do well to learn from a master of the Coldlands.”

“He’s a rebel and an interloper,” the Waterbender answers gruffly. “If he were one of ours I’d see him impaled on an ice pick.... However, our sister tribe is known for its impudence.”

“Fantastic getting know you too, Chief,” Kohaku says, his face brightening to a cat owl’s sneer in an instant.

“That doesn’t give you an excuse!” The man snaps.

Surreptitiously Iroh studies the Waterbender. Few records survived regarding the history of the barricaded Northern Water Tribe, but the man’s garb and demand for respect speaks highly of a leading tribesman. Kohaku’s allusion to his rank might not be a jest.

“We are honored by your benevolence, Master......” Iroh allows the silence to speak for his ignorance.

The Waterbender huffs. “I grant you my services, nothing more. It is credited to your honesty that I have not swamped this boat to the bottom of the trench you cross in your ignorance.”

_Don’t push any further,_ the warning implies.

The Waterbender withdraws his hand from Zuko’s face at last, flicking the water aside before reaching for a small bottle. It’s a curiously delicate bauble in the hands of one who looks like a fur-clad wilderness trapper.

“This is a treasure of our homeland; one I would not bequeath to men of fire and blood,” the Waterbender tells Iroh gravely. “For the sake of your child I will heal him. The Spirits revealed the mark on his face to our seers, speaking of a future of peace. If this were not so, we would have ambushed your ship in the night for trespassing.”

Jun grips Tarou’s arm before he can grapple with his sword, but the murmurs around them cannot be withheld. Iroh merely nods. He was well aware of the risk of a lone ship entering savage lands.

“I must remove the bandages,” the Waterbender warns him.

“Come on,” Ju whispers, tightening her grip and dragging Tarou to the staircase. “You don’t need to watch this.”

“I’m not... I can....” But the young soldier is already pale, free hand pressed against his stomach, and he doesn’t look back as he’s led off-deck.

“Anyone else?” the Waterbender says, one eyebrow raised in scorn.

“Do what you must,” Iroh compels him.

“I’ll help, Kohaku mumbles, springing to the prince’s side. “I put together this mess. I know how to take it off.”

Kin and Huang and Hui wander to the railing, focusing their attention on ice-pocked waves. Jee’s teeth clack down as he laces his hands more severely behind his back. Kohaku starts murmuring drivel, taking the thin knife Deming offers and cutting bandages away as the Northern tribesman softens the clay beneath.

Zuko starts balking, a high-pitched, unceasing whine whistling from his abused throat. Jee staggers forward to assist but the Waterbender holds up his hand, ordering him to stand down. Uncapping the vial, he trickles a few drops into his hand and lays it on Zuko’s forehead. The boy whimpers once and falls slack.

Kohaku shoots a dark glare at Iroh as though to say, ‘ _I told you they would help.’_

The rest of the bandaged are removed, and once more Iroh is faced with the jagged bone and purpled flesh that is his nephew’s face. (He once resembled his father. Now he is unrecognizable to his own crew.)

The Waterbender sighs. “The pride of the Fire Nation,” he mutters. He pours the vial in a thin, weaving stream, guiding it to rest on ridges and clefts in bone first, before smoothing it to cover the rest of the jaw. Zuko’s eyes snap open and he kicks out, screeching as bone suddenly snaps down and straightens. Kohaku lunges to pin the boy’s arms, grimacing as a boot catches him in the stomach. Stitches pop and slices in the flesh smooth over, ragged tears in the mouth give way to pink skin, and Iroh sees the teeth align as Zuko opens his mouth wide and screams.

“Hold his head, not his arms!” the Waterbender chastises, scowling when the prince thrashes to avoid the water. “I’m not finished yet.”

“Is it really that complicated to market your stupid spirit water?” Kohaku shouts, pressing one knee into Zuko’s torso while Iroh drops to cradle the boy’s head. “People die without that stuff you know!”

“If the world was not so ready to make war, perhaps we could share our resources,” the Waterbender retorts. “Or do you think the Fire Nation would respond benevolently to those who refuse to bow their necks?”

“I’m just saying, I want a barrel of it,” Kohaku grunts, breathing out shakily as Zuko finally shudders and falls still. 

“And what would you use it for?” the Waterbender challenges, casting the rusty, grey dregs over the deck railing. “It is useless without a Bender.”

“I thought maybe I’d hire Katara,” Kohaku muses. He falls back, heaving, sweat trickling down his face. “Little snappish thing that Zuko’s been following around. Figured it’s only a matter of time before he kidnaps her again.”

_“Uncle....?”_

The argument ceases as a weak hand flops to grip Iroh’s arm, gold eyes blinking painfully in the light. Both eyes are bright and alert, Iroh realizes with a start. Perhaps it is his imagination, but the scar does not appear to be so prominent. 

Zuko waggles his jaw experimentally, swallowing as tears of a different sort shine at the surface. He clears his throat with a wretched grimace, and says in a frail, tremulous voice, “What’s going on? How....?”

“Hush. Do not strain yourself,” Iroh soothes. His hands quiver as he palms the boy’s cheek, smooth lines even and solid under his fingertips. Weak with relief, he looks at their source of mercy. “How shall we repay you?”

“Perhaps... if the current Fire Lord suddenly becomes _unsuitable_ for the throne... we might discuss terms in a better future,” the Waterbender hints.

“I would be glad to do so, Chief.....”

“That does not matter now,” the Waterbender says dismissively. He does not deny the title, however. Rising laboriously, he scrutinizes Zuko and frowns in thought. “The fates of our people are intertwined, young prince. Do not make me regret this day.”

“I won’t.” Weak but resolute, knowing what he has been saved from despite the mystery surrounding his benefactor, Zuko nods. He is not one to give his word lightly.

“Until better time,” the chief says to Iroh. He turns his back deliberately on the crew, escorting himself to his own ship. Only Kohaku has the courtesy to see him off — the rest of the crew shuffles closer as Zuko sits up.

“I’ve never seen anything like it....”

“Are you still in pain, your highness?”

“Should’ve picked up a Bender at that port instead of Kohaku....”

“Are you all right now? Can you open your jaw all the way? Wait a minute, we’ll bring Kohaku back and he can check —“

“Enough.” Iroh rests his hands on Zuko’s shoulders, sheltering the teen as he shuffles back inch by inch, alarmed by the sudden attention. “Prince Zuko needs his rest. Return to your duties.”

“Okay, but I still need to examine him,” Kohaku calls back from the starboard railing. “I mean later! Lighten up, old man. I’m not going to start poking at him right after a Master Bender does his work. Go shuffle him into a sun patch — or better still, let him see his own room again. Kid’s gotta be pining for his own gloomy decor.”

Zuko relaxes marginally at the suggestion, but it’s clear he won’t be capable of managing the stairs alone. Thin legs slide shakily off the surgery bed, bare feet planting uncertainly on the floor, and suddenly there’s a crewman on either side taking an arm. Jee and Kin look straight ahead, and simultaneously the rest of the crew finds innocuous tasks to spare the teen their attention as he tries to relearn his balance. Three weeks of fever have stripped the meat from his bones, but the cook will fix that soon enough. (Iroh can already hear pots and utensils clanging downstairs — the man is a true menace when he thinks the prince is ignoring his health.)

They bring Zuko to his room without incident, where Jun salutes apathetically before slipping out the door. (She’s already turned down the covers and laid out sleep clothes, which smell far fresher than the loose robe Zuko is clad in now.) There’s a brief, mumbled argument before Jee and Kin leave, and Iroh turns his back while Zuko haltingly, arduously redresses himself. When Iroh turns around again Zuko is curled up to face the wall, still wiggling his jaw like he wants to make sure it works, his cheeks aflame with humiliation as he plucks at the covers bunched around his knees.

“Even a dragon relies on the wind to buoy his wings,” Iroh says, bringing up the covers and tucking them securely. Instinctively he avoids pressing the fabric around Zuko’s chin. “There is no shame in allowing others to help you.”

“I’m tired of being helpless,” Zuko murmurs.

“I know these last weeks were difficult.” Iroh should not press the matter now, but he cannot leave it unspoken another day. “Zuko, I do not ask for your forgiveness. I was careless and did not see you before it was too late. If I had only —“

Golden eyes startle as Zuko rolls onto his back, pawing out to grab Iroh’s hand. “Uncle, you’re not.... I jumped in front.... you’re not supposed to apologize.”

Iroh closes his eyes, but shakes his head. “Do not pity an old man, Zuko. I have seen more years of war than many admirals. It is the actions of fools that lead to destruction. You could have died.”

“I didn’t.... I wasn’t....” Fear in memory tarnishes gold and Zuko flops to face the wall again. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I understand,” Iroh reassures him. He imprints the sight to memory — the stubbornly grit jaw, unbruised skin, and scowl bred of discontent. Only the memories remain of those shattering moments.

He wishes that the Waterbender had erased the memories of pain, as well as the outer signs.

“I will let you rest now,” Iroh says, exhaustion sweeping over him as he rises. The terror is past, but his nightmares have only begun. There are still many sleepless nights ahead for all of his men.

“Uncle?” Zuko calls in a small voice.

Iroh turns around to see the boy looking uncertainly over his shoulder. “Is something troubling you?”

Grimacing, Zuko turns himself gingerly and stares again, finally blurting out, “You cut your hair?”

Ah. That. 

“It was merely a formality,” Iroh says, hoping to ease the boy’s distress. “I exchanged it for something better”

“But... but your honor.....” Zuko is no fool. He knows the implications. “They won’t let you.... What if Zhao.... What if you can’t go _home?”_

Oh, Zuko. If only he could understand, there is no place for Iroh in a world with an empty heart and a bloody throne. 

“Some things are worth more than honor and prestige, Zuko,” Iroh merely says. “Let others judge from what they see with their eyes alone. My character remains untouched.”

“But — but the Waterbender,” Zuko insists. “We’re traitors now... aren’t we?”

He looks like his entire world has crumbled; walls falling into themselves, foundations cracked. Iroh refrains from swooping in to embrace the young man. It is time for him choose his own path, and it will not be made simpler with sentimental reassurances.

“The ground accepts the rain, but the storm cannot force flowers to bloom,” Iroh says. “The North has done us a great service. How you choose to use this gift is up to you. We are not traitors until we forsake the goodness within ourselves.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Zuko asks dully. He flops down with a cross scowl, too weak to sit up any longer.

“That depends on your interpretation,” Iroh states. “Your destiny is not set in stone, Prince Zuko. What you choose decides the man you will become.”

“I already know what I’ll become,” Zuko mumbles, eyelids sliding shut. “M’gonna be Fire Lord.”

So he will, one day. What kind of Fire Lord he will be might have been decided in this season of trauma, when a Waterbender chose to save the heir of a warring nation. Zuko will not forget this act of mercy.

Closing the door softly, Iroh falls against it and breathes. Around him the ship bustles. Jee ruthlessly drills his squad, the cook barks at his aides to wash more pans, and the physician paces and shouts in the engine room. The healing has only begun, and few will sleep through the night. It is no surprise to Iroh that Zuko didn’t ask him to put out the light before he left.

Straightening his robes, Iroh smooths his expression and turns down the hall, nodding to Huang as they pass one another. When Zuko is himself again, they will speak of the matter of the North. Perhaps there is opportunity for communication in the future. Agni knows the boy needs to practice his formal penmanship.

Maybe there is a friendly port down the way that smuggles the arctic version of a messenger hawk. There must be room for a rookery somewhere on the ship..... 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kohaku is my complicated Water Tribe interloper who was created for another story that was too complex and never posted. I never had a "cultural reveal" planned for him in this one, but it sort of came out.... Ah, well.


	30. Bedazzle (DragonWing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The general and his motley crew may not trust him, but Zhao is rather possessive of Prince Zuko — in the way a mother cat owl bites her kittens for running away before smoothing the dirt and debris out of their fur. (Or, the one in which Zhao is secretly a draik and is determined to adopt Zuko by force.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Draik!Zhao is still creepy, but no NC-17 implications intended. He is merely a dragon... murderer... with every intent of herding in a rebellious young snapper... or else cripple him... with compassion, of course.

His parents locked him away whenever the urges came upon him. He remembers shredded metal tearing into his sensitive claws as he tried to find the way out. Waking up with bruises and swollen knots from where he flung himself against the walls. Six impermeable panels encasing him, pressing against his wings as he spat flame that was quickly consumed by the dark.

His parents always had a reason to explain the bruises and the cries in the night. Such a clumsy child, always trying to play with his father’s swords. High recommendations for the army.

There is an herbalist still alive who has been lavishly sworn to secrecy for years. It seems that the extravagant blessings of the jasmine flowers can soothe a dragon’s brutality, and tether the rational mind to the body during transformation. But tying down the dragon’s free thoughts can lead to an eventual blur between the lines, the herbalist warns. Restrain the beast, and the savagery is due to come out in one form or another.

Zhao has controlled his transformations since he was seven years old, and he doesn’t notice any difference. A simple concentration of a rare and expensive flower, and he can even retain his own thoughts whilst trapped in his hideous form.

Some instincts are impossible to remove from the soul, however. Just as the human thoughts control the dragon, sometimes the beast curls within the man.

General Iroh makes no allusion to a scaly stowaway which surely makes random appearances on his ship, but Zhao can smell it on the prince. Smog and fresh coals and a familiar whiff which no human can detect, but Zhao has associated with gold in its purest form. His suspicions are only confirmed by the tea forced on the sullen prince, while the general requests ginseng. Jasmine abates all concerns for a daylight transformation.

He hasn’t seen one of his own kind in his entire lifetime of secrecy. The dark curl of triumph goads him to slip away with the boy alone, and wait for the change to force itself before clipping a wing. Present the crippled draik to the Fire Lord and annul all suspicions on himself. Glory and power and revenge, all wrapped into one banished child.

Something fiercer leaves Zhao grinding his teeth, his fingers curling like claws until ceramic shatters and boiling jasmine tea spatters his hand.

“You are feeling well, Commander Zhao?” Iroh innocuously observes.

“Fine, General. I have a firm grip.” On his control, and his senses. He does not need to involve the boy in his plans — the boy **_is_** his plan to usurp this dying legacy of rulers once and for all.

(Unless the clan leaders were to meet tragic ends, one by one, and then who would be left to put on the throne but a young and pliable draik? Led, of course, by the only other of his kind, who would graciously and benevolently rear him to conquer the four kingdoms and raise up the last surviving dragons to slaughter anyone who opposed them.)

“If you boil your tea leaves any longer, you will discover a bitter brew,” Iroh warns him.

Zhao glances at the second teacup in his hand (which has steamed down to the dregs) and smile. “Of course. How considerate of you to remind me.”

He needs to get the boy away from this senile old fool.

Craftiness is a dragon’s specialty, but it doesn’t work well on members of their kind. Zuko rebuffs him at every offer, surly and rebellious and cantankerous in turns. He is young and spry, and somehow more focused than Zhao despite the useless hours spent with a febrile, detached mind. Zhao loses the Agni Kai and the chance to show the upstart draik what a real dragon is capable of. That’s all right. He has a long lifespan to try again.

He tries to steal the prince away with his crew. Stage a death so the old man doesn’t go looking for him. The fools he hires blow up the ship with the prince inside. Such a tragedy for General Iroh to bear.

Zhao doesn’t believe the mockery of grief. Draiks are sturdy creatures, and if Zuko had so much as bruised his wings, Iroh wouldn’t be offering his services now. The boy is still out there; hiding.

He must be _very_ well hidden. Zhao smells gold for days but doesn’t see so much as a scale on his ship. There is a heavy odor of jasmine incense on every level, however — to honor his nephew‘s spirit, Iroh claims. It’s infuriatingly calming, and Zhao reaches the end of the week with a disturbing revelation that he hasn’t threatened the helmsman once. He tosses the man overboard just for the sake of consistency.

When he kills the Moon Spirit he nearly loses control. The dragon within has warred with the sky and won. He wants to roar his triumph; to spread wings like copper and blood and melt the trite walls sheltering the Northern simpletons.

He nearly has a second chance to pin down the whippersnapper who dare defy his elders. Fire meets fire in a clash over ocean, and Zhao can see the subtle quivers under human skin as Zuko tries to hold back his wings. He thinks to slap down the boy's rebellion first — perhaps pin a blade through his leg so he’ll be forced to expose his wings in order to flee — but the ocean itself interferes and Zhao allows himself to be carried away from the fight.

(He won’t drown. He can hold his breath for up to an hour, and the ocean is only water, after all. Hot steam makes geysers and propulsion always finds the nearest outlet. Zhao crawls onto the shore while the moon shines merrily to spite him, and gnashes his teeth as his wings flap around him like red curtains. He hasn’t lost yet. Let them think him dead, until the opportune time.)

There will be another confrontation. A final Agni Kai. This time he will find the boy in his draik form, unguarded and carefree and enslaved to mindless instinct. The smaller draik will cower before a greater predator. And Zhao, armored with claws that can rake through steel and wings that can buffet small ships, will hold the urchin in the dust and bridle his loyalty before cutting off the tip of a wing.

If he cannot rule as lord protector to the future Fire Lord, then a Fire Lord shall not sit on the throne at all. The Fire Nation will still tremble in the age of dragons, when Zhao throws their last trembling royal down in a heap.

(The buried part of him reasons that there is no need to cripple the young draik — yet. His loyalties are malleable, and without another clan member he will fall back on the nearest protector. He will not fight for long. There is no need to damage him.)

Zhao battens down the weakness and spreads his wings in the rising sun, closing his eyes as the inner flame rejuvenates. He will lose time by concealing them again, but he does not intend to reveal himself to every fisherman and dock wife. He can swim the distance well enough, and take his chances on the winds of moonless nights. He will find his quarry, and if he is fortunate, the old man who accompanies him. It will be most satisfying to rend flesh from bone and toss the scraps at Zuko's feet.

(In this the dragon agrees. The pudgy war dog has no idea what he’s dealing with. A poor excuse for a protector. Once those ties are severed, the young draik will have no one left to rely on but his own kind. Yes, this is a good plan.)

Ignoring the silky thoughts by force of habit, Zhao rises and tracks the sun. Rusty wings withdraw and the horns retract into his skull as scales melt into skin. His feet are bare, but he does not feel the cold.

Flexing just enough claw into his feet to grip the ice, Zhao sets forth across the icy tundra. Unlike the fools who perished tonight, he will still be remembered in history. The one who killed the moon... and rose up to rule over the Fire Nation as the first in the line of Dragon Lords.


	31. Camaraderie (DragonWing AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If Jet had known healed wings meant the draik would leave them, he might have done something drastic. But he doesn't know anything about Fire Nation fables, and he doesn't know how close they are to losing their new pet dragon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: none

Draiks are not cute. Especially when they snarl at random and snatch away complacent archers’ pillows, clawing them into feathered fragments. And then bolt around like lizards on cactus juice, wings quivering, wild eyes searching the outskirts of the camp.

“Longshot, what’d you do?” Smellerbee asks, yipping when the draik jumps over her and continues pacing, searching the trees around them. (So maybe it feels a little lost. They had to cart it out of Ba Sing Se in a covered wheelbarrow before rumors about golden wolfbats reached the Dai Li.)

The draik lunges for Jet’s pack, claws poised to rend, and that’s where he draws the line.

“Back off!” Jet yells, leaping up to match the beast’s challenge. Not a good idea, in hindsight. This is going to end in blood and his swords are below Lake Laogi. Longshot had _better_ shoot first.

The thing yowls and crouches, scratching at the dust, tail swishing agitatedly. Its face is maniacal. Livid. Like it’s walked into a trap and wants out, and doesn’t know where the door is.

Jet takes another look at the wings and sees faint lines between the webbing. Only one wing is bruised, but the other one flinches and flaps, as though in memory of pain. 

Everything starts to make sense.

“Someone hurt it before,” Jet states. He stares the draik down, demanding command of the turf.

“Yeah, we know. The scar pretty much says it,” Smellerbee says.

“No. After that. This one’s fresh.” Someone must have injured the wing. Could’ve been a passing circus, using pain and medicine to keep the dragon in a cowed state.

Jet might understand that a little.

“Tea shop ruse,” Longshot reminds them darkly. His sharp frown speaks of mental murders and dismemberments. Jet shakes his head. No one’s playing assassin in Ba Sing Se tonight.

“So he thinks we’re going to hurt him,” Smellerbee realizes, hugging her pillow protectively when the draik slinks away from Jet and starts prowling, growling a low chitter. “Why... because his wings are hurt?”

“Any number of reasons.” Jet watches the draik eye him and flick out a claw, like it might just tear open their only rice bag. “No.”

It’s not his imagination that the thing shrugs — and then spats fire onto the wheelbarrow.

“Oh Vaatu,” Longshot mutters, scrambling for a waterskin.

“Jet?” Smellerbee yelps, unsheathing her dagger with dubious intent. 

“Don’t kill him!” Longshot simultaneous insists, aiming the waterskin to splatter the draik with a thin stream. It jumps three feet backwards and shakes its head, screeching like a toddler. Claws gouge foot-deep trenches into the earth and it gathers to spring.

“Hey!” Three sprints and Jet stands between them, motioning for Longshot to stand back. He bares his teeth and snarls, holding out one hand in a command to halt.

The draik covers the distance in one lunge and stops just shy of Jet’s outstretched hand, a faint trickle of heat singeing the skin. (Images tear through his mind, skeined in the red glow of smog: a man huddling over his kids before the roof falls in; his aunt’s hair catching fire; a baby screaming as the woolen blankets in its crib catch and shrivel in seconds.) Jet shakes, his eyes as wide as the draik’s, but he won’t stand down. This is his territory. The lizard kid can take his pain out on something else — preferably someone more Firebendy or garbed in a pointed green hat.

Steaming breaths slow and the draik sits back, golden eyes looking less like a demented hawk’s and more... soulful. It chirps once, the sound distinctively inquiring, and then flops down heavily on its rump, golden tale coiling tightly around its clawed hands and feet.

_Not moving anywhere,_ the stance promises.

Like Jet’s going to believe that. He lowers his hand but doesn’t relax his stance, glaring the beast down. “Don’t. Try that again.”

He’s not even sure how much the thing understands, but it makes a low, repentant sound and ducks down, wings pulling around it like a tent.

“Temper tantrum?” Longshot proposes, ruefully picking pine needles out of his shredded pillow.

“I’m starting to agree with Jet,” Smellerbee says shakily. “If that’s just a tantrum, we don’t want to be around when he gets _really_ angry.”

“He won’t,” Jet decides, folding his arms as the draik whines, practically cocooned now in floppy wings. _See, perfectly harmless,_ the stupid pose tries to emulate. _Can’t attack anyone like this._

Jet would love to see the draik try. The undignified trip-up might be worth a skirmish. And he’d have a good excuse to punch it.

“Not angry. Scared,” Longshot explains to Smellerbee.

“He’s probably testing us,” Jet considers. “Trying to see if we’re out to sell him.” He might go back and burn the old man’s tea shop. 

“Well, how do we tell him we’re not?” Smellerbee wonders. “I mean, we didn’t _ask_ him to join us. He followed you.”

“Leave him,” Jet decides, deliberately turning away. There’s an awkward scramble as the draik uncurls himself. Longshot muffles a snigger. 

“If he wants to stay he’ll behave,” Jet says pointedly, shooting a glare at the draik as it... _he_.... stares up from where he’s flopped over with a wing still folded under his legs.

“Now he just looks pathetic,” Smellerbee says, making a face. “He’s like a crococat. Only there’s more collateral damage if his fur’s rubbed the wrong way.”

“Any caged animal will lash out.” Jet sits cross-legged at the fire, glaring when the draik shuffles closer. No. They’re not friends, especially after the fiendish golden monstrosity scared him half to death him by shredding Longshot’s pillow. 

The draik whines and slinks over to Longshot, who proves he’s a compassionate nuisance that coddles sharp-toothed legends and transforming tea servers. The archer hums sympathetically and scratches one finger around the uninjured horn. “Feel better now, Feng?”

There’s a whump of miserable dragon plopping at his commiserator’s feet, and that just ruins everything Jet’s tried to establish about “No property damage,” and “Bad dragon.”

“So how do we convince him we’re not going to put him in a cage?” Smellerbee establishes. “Besides bringing back the old man’s head to prove he’s not going to hurt Li anymore?” 

“Smeller,” Longshot lectures with a soft sigh.

“What? Anyone who makes his ‘nephew’ work in a tea shop and then transform for all of Ba Sing Se to gawk over deserves to be dragged through the streets and hung on display.”

“We’re not going back to kill the uncle,” Jet orders. “Let’s just get the kid out of here before someone tries to steal him back.”

And suddenly the beast has become something humanlike and fragile. That’s.... slightly less disturbing than he’s going to let on. 

“Back to Gaipan, then?” Smellerbee says resignedly. She thunks her chin into her pillow and mumbles, “Feels like we just got here....”

“Sure,” Jet says, clacking his tongue. “Let’s take a temperamental fire-breather to a summer scorched forest.”

“It is one way to smoke out the Scorchers,” Smellerbee says, snorting.

“Air Temple,” Longshot speaks up.

“What.” Jet blames it on the ruined hat that’s no longer properly containing the archer’s freewheeling thoughts, because he did _not_ just hear that.

“Western. Air Temple,” Longshot says slowly. “It’s empty.”

“Sorry, you lost me at _air_ temple,” Jet says. “One, that sounds vaguely inhospitable, and two — how do you even know this?”

“Caves, walkways, archways,” Longshot says, sighing as he draws a picturesque fairy castle in the dirt. “Dragon territory.”

“He means it’s a great place to fly,” Smellerbee pitches in.

“I know what he means,” Jet snaps. “But nobody’s been to an Air Temple in years. What makes you think it’s safe to occupy?”

Longshot cats him a _look_ and points his stick at Li. “Dragon.”

Which is meant to imply fierce, fighting warrior who will barbecue their enemies. Said dragon is currently a croco _kitten_ basking on Longshot’s folded knees like he found his littermate. Some guard beast.

“If there really is an Air Temple standing, and if it isn’t guarded by Fire Nation soldiers, then the Avatar is probably already on his way there,” Jet figures.

Dragon-Li’s ears twitch. 

“Aw, sorry Jet. Didn’t think we’d run into your girlfriend so soon,” Smellerbee snarks.

“You know that would make Sokka your technical team-brother-in-law,” Jet shoots back.

Smellerbee presses her mouth into a thin line and hunches further over her pillow, seceding the argument. 

Stretching his arms, Jet makes way back to his bedroll and intently punches his nearly flat excuse for a pillow to show the little shredder it’s not for chewing.

Li takes that as an open invitation.

“Longshot, keep your dragon on your side of the campfire!” Jet shouts, kicking out as a (surprisingly sturdy) conglomeration of scales tries to wriggle into his personal space.

“Draik,” Longshot corrects in a bored tone. He sighs and picks up his bedroll, flopping it down next to the golden menace and settling in. _This is my side of the campfire now._

Huffing smugness, Li shuffles closer to Longshot and deliberately presses his eyelids shut. Well, two can play that game. Jet snatches up his blanket and stomps over to Smellerbee’s corner.

“Budge over,” he says, slapping his pillow down at her feet.

_“Je-et!”_ Smellerbee whines. “You haven’t done team cuddles without frost to back it since I was seven! I’m not letting Longshot’s _pet_ interrupt my sleep — you kick at night!”

“Yeah, well you snore,” Jet grumbles, deliberately flexing his toes in Smellerbee’s face.

“You are such a dirty peasant,” Smellerbee grumbles, crinkling her nose. She flounces onto her side and kicks back, burying her feet in Jet’s hair. 

Oh, this is so not going to work.

“Stop killing trees,” Longshot murmurs when Jet rolls to his feet and grabs Smellerbee’s dagger. “We don’t need any more firewood.”

“You want to joust then?” Jet challenges. The archer yawns and he mutters, “Thought so.”

“Guys, go to sleep!” Smellerbee pleads. “It’s nearly dawn!”

“You do realize if not for the teashop kid we’d be home in our own beds right now?” Jet points out.

“Yep,” Longshot agrees. “With the fleas and the mold.”

A shoe smacks the archer in the head and Smellerbee rolls over, slapping her pillow over her face. “Shut up and sleep already!”

Jet snickers at Longshot’s perplexed look, and slips into the woods where he can find something nice and dead to hack at. He doesn’t realize he has a shadow.

* * *

Smellerbee’s dagger is too short and narrow for a proper tree feud, and Jet doesn’t want to replace it when she scrutinizes the edge. (Girls are so particular.) He sheathes the blade carefully and stomps down the rest of the branch, chucking it over his shoulder. 

Something growls in rabid excitement and slams into the dirt, claws kicking wildly as bark spatters the leaves overhead.

Jet’s halfway up in the tree brandishing the dagger before he realizes the golden eyes watching him belong to Longshot’s newest puppy-kitten. (With fangs. And a literally blazing temper.)

“Go back to Longhshot!” Jet hisses, jabbing the dagger at the draik. “Git!”

The draik plops over and rolls, chomping delightedly on his new stick. (It’s a six-foot-long tree branch and he’s gnawing it like a badger leg. Disturbing has been elevated to new levels.) Shaking his head, Jet settles more comfortably on his tree limb and just... watches. (Because the little sharp-tooth could get tired of his chew toy at any time, and they haven’t seen him hunt his own meat yet. Freedom Fighter is not going to be on tonight’s menu.)

Dragon-Li gags abruptly and hisses, spewing out chunks of bark. Another snarly grimace and a rapid waggle of the jaw follows. Ah, slivers. Serves the wolfbat right for stealing Jet’s branch.

Twitching his nose, the draik steps back and coughs flame, lapping his tongue around his teeth and spitting charcoaled particles before repeating the process twice more. He smacks in satisfaction and goes back to trouncing the branch.

What an idiot.

Jet watches for a while, trying to comprehend that this is _Li_ , the scowly-faced tea spiller who nearly took off his face with a dao sword. Where's the eternal grumpiness; the desire the fight everything that _breathes?_ (Or is he just that happy that he doesn't have to back to Ba Sing Se?)

There are some things that are better not to think about. Now seems as good a time as any to sneak down and out, while the draik is busy whittling the branch down to a knobby twig. 

The instant Jet touches earth the draik springs upright and chitters. (Maybe it’s a growl — it’s pretty hard to tell when the dopey thing has a branch clamped in his jaws.) 

“Down, Wolfbat,” Jet says gruffly. “You try jumping me and I’ll give you one in the nose.”

Dragon-Li looks on with the intelligence of a drunken chameleon. Before Jet can even turn properly the draik lopes forward and jabs the stick at his leg.

“Stop it!” Jet orders, dagger in hand before his head clues in that the draik hasn’t brandished any claws yet.

Eyes gleaming, Li taps the end of his stick against the blade. He pounces back, quivering, tail swishing madly as he eyes the dagger.

Well that’s... more like the snobby tea shop peasant.

“You wanna joust?” Jet says slowly. He brings up the dagger slowly, watching the draik’s response. 

Chitter-growling, Dragon-Li shuffles to the right and eyes Jet critically, clacking its jaws for a more accurate swing before swishing the branch at his legs. 

It’s an easy jump back, and Jet’s retaliating swing is met with a dull clack as the draik remembers to walk on his feet properly and stands up to meet the charge. This is going to be the worst fight ever. It’s obvious the draik is aiming for the knife and not his opponent, he won’t pick up the branch in his scaled hands like a proper duelist, and all Jet has to do is let the knife hit the wood and the golden varmint goes crazy. 

It’s like tossing a stick for a komodo rhino. The draik doesn’t even use his claws. He just bounds about, blocking Jet’s casual slashes and tripping up as he tries to jab, wasting all of his energy by pouncing from side to side, as if any moment he hopes Jet will sprout wings and make it an all-out brawl. 

Jet does not humor a snarly lizard. He slashes wood until his arm is tired and the branch is knicked with tapered triangles and Dragon-Li is nearly tripping over the ends. He’s tired before the draik is, and it’s a very smirky dragon who traipses beside him as they head back to camp.

Longshot looks up with hollow eyes when Jet returns. It’s just past sunrise and the archer’s hands are shaking. Nightmares again.

“Not tired?” Longshot wonders, rubbing his eyes. He looks sternly at Smellerbee’s dagger and holds out his hand, already digging for his whetstone.

“Played with the dragon,” Jet says briskly, dropping the sheathed blade into Longshot’s hand. “He’s still hyper. It’s your turn.”

Blinking dazedly at Dragon-Li (or _Feng_ , when he’s Longshot’s problem), the archer sets down the whetstone and takes hold of the stick, tugging gently. Immediately the draik lets go and darts back, gathering himself for a leaping prance as the archer lets the stick fly. Tumbling wings-over-tail, the draik yowls and chomps, sharp teeth scraping nastily, before he shakes the stick like a dead fire ferret and runs up to deposit it at Longshot’s feet. The archer eyes Jet smugly and tosses the branch again.

“You mean I spent a whole night stabbing at a stick and all he wanted was to play fetch?” Jet says acidly.

“Draiks need exercise,” Longshot explains pleasantly.

Smellerbee sits up and rubs her face agitatedly, a hairline between screaming and throwing the jook pot at Longshot’s head. “ _Sunrise?_ Right at sunrise? What is wrong with you people? Why'd we ever get a _Fire Nation_ dragon, anyways?”

* * *

Dragon-Li eventually becomes Feng, because he seems less like a tea server and more like a chirpy sparrowkeet as the days pass. (And because Longshot keeps bribing him with bits of tender rabbit innards when he responds to his new name.) To Smellerbee’s dismay, the little Firebreather sets the schedule — and it includes afternoon nappy time. (Because a dragon who spends half the night chasing squirrels has to conk out sooner or later.) 

Mornings start early, when Feng does something stupid like stick his head in the jook pot (and retaliate against the bruising to his still-healing horn by clanging the iron clappertrap around the camp). Jet takes him for a morning romp (a dragon is not a dog, he will not stoop to Longshot’s ideas and throw chunks of termite-infested forest debris when a good run tires the draik just as easily), and usually they come back with something furry and maimed that makes the first of Feng’s six or ten morning snacks. (It’s nice to know the draik isn’t going to eat his playmates, but Jet has the impression he’s accustomed to bigger game. Small wonder the kid was always snapping at his uncle and grabbing for sharp objects. They probably habitually starved him to keep him tame.)

That... just makes Jet want to turn back and maim somebody. He tosses half his rabbit to the mooching draik and deliberates how they’re going to string Mushi up by his toes once he comes looking for his showpiece.

Towards afternoon, Feng starts getting yawny, dragging his feet a little more every time they pass a nice sunning spot. Longshot embraces his lazy side and picks a grassy patch right at the peak of afternoon, shredded hat shading his face, boots kicked off to inform Jet he’s not getting up for at least an hour, thank you. Feng flops out his sore wings and snuffles happily, kicking out from time to time like he’s trouncing rabbits in his sleep (or maybe nasty Firebenders). Smellerbee takes the opportunity to catch up on her lost sleep, and takes to using Feng as her nap estimator — if the dragon’s not up yet, Jet had better not bother her!

Evening is hunt time again, but it’s pack hunt, apparently. Longshot and Feng disappear for hours at a time (Jet’s pretty sure they’re indulging in extra naps or maybe head scratches) and return with ten or twelve rabbits. Sometimes Feng drags back larger game. (He never wants to know how the baby unagi found its way to shore.) There’s always concern when midsized skunk bear is on the menu — Feng obviously can’t fly and that horn could crack again if it’s hit just right — but Longshot knows how to aim for the eyes, and Jet figures that if anyone interferes with the archer’s snuffly night heater, they’re going to wish for unagi-infested waters. 

Nights are sleep time for all. They used to sneak out on raids at twilight, returning in the late morning, but Feng is persnickety about his routine and he gets snappish when the sun sets, threatening mayhem and random vandalism if someone doesn’t toss a bedroll down and cuddle him to sleep. (And they all learn to go to bed early. Midnight means play time again.)

They keep heading west. There’s a limit to where else they can go, and some inner certainty makes Jet walk faster when the draik flexes his wings and glares, like he knows something is wrong and they’re refusing to do anything about it. Maybe a fairy castle in the sky will convince him that he really is free. 

(But where will he take that freedom, if he flies too far to come back? To the old man who enslaved him? Or does he have family he hasn’t seen in years?) Jet wakes up some mornings hating the draik’s kin, who put the whine in his soft snuffles and the longing in golden eyes that back towards Ba Sing Se. He doesn’t.... he doesn’t _want_ the kid to wander off again.

The universe never pays any heed to Jet’s visions for the future. 

He blames it on the patch of fur. Longshot picks it off a branch, rubbing the three-inch white strands and remarking on the softness, and Feng goes ballistic. Rolling in grass that looks like something large squashed it overnight, springing off every tree that carries a scent, circling boulders incessantly as if someone might be hiding just around the other end. 

He keeps up that chitter-whine for hours, even when they’re far past the place, sniffing the air and watching the sky. He slips off during the night, and Jet can hear his claws skitter as he searches the canyon. A subdued and exhausted draik rejoins them in the morning and slogs along, barely aware that the mid-afternoon nap switches to mid-morning on Longshot’s insistence.

Two days later, the draik finds himself a high perch and watches Jet intently, stretching out his wings. 

“Hold up,” Jet warns Smellerbee in a low voice, halting her morning packing and pointing up.

Satisfied with his audience of three (a more haughty draik was never before seen), Feng flaps experimentally a few times and pounces. 

He’s done it a few times before. Longshot’s scraped gravel out of his chin. 

This time the golden wings falter, snap steady, and keep the draik aloft for two solid flaps before he touches ground with a stumbling skid. Twirling around to try and inspect his wings from every angle, Feng finally sits back and smirks, golden webbing folding into relaxed angles at either side. 

“Feel better?” Longshot praises, stepping forward to scratch both of the draik’s horns. (Come to think of it, the right one doesn’t seem to bother him any more.) “Good boy.”

If Jet had only known the connection between draiks and their wings, he might have done something drastic in the night. (They would have forgiven him... eventually. Better for one little nick in the tissue than for the kid to run off on his own and hurt himself again.)

But he doesn’t realize the implications, and it’s a cold shock to everyone when gold wings slip into a very _human_ spine one morning. Li looks up from a thatch of scruffy hair, startled and wet-eyed and blushing scarlet, and Longshot hugs himself with barely repressed tears as the tea server fumbles to put on one of Jet’s spare shirts. 

He doesn’t answer any questions about why he was a happy goldfinch for weeks and suddenly he’s back to being... well, a grouchy tea-server. In fact, he doesn’t talk at all, except for mumbled apologies for whatever the dragon did and begging directions to the next town. Longshot gets ready to pull out one his precious maps and send his little friend on the way. Jet plops the kid down and makes him _breathe_ for two minutes before demanding a rational plan of attack.

“My uncle....” Li says furtively, flushing deeper (which should be physically impossible at this point). “He doesn’t know I’m.....”

“Safe,” Jet insists. “You’re safe here. You don’t have to go back.”

“I don’t belong... He doesn’t know... I don’t know if he’s still.... I never should’ve.....”

“Feng.... _Li_ ,” Jet corrects himself with a grimace, “Calm down. You’re safe here. We’re just south of the ruins. You don’t have to go back to Ba Sing Se.”

He can see the draik’s.... the kid’s eyes calculating distance and location. Li breathes shallowly, hands twitching, and his gaze suddenly latches onto Longshot’s pack. 

“Where did you get that?”

It’s the dragon charm, Jet realizes belatedly. Six inches of white fur gathered from that clearing, braided with a couple beads and tied off with a piece of rawhide. Longshot used to dangle it in front of the draik’s nose whenever he got agitated. Something about the smell made him a very sappy and cuddle-craving puddle of sadness.

“We’re.... not really sure what that was,” Jet says dubiously. 

Li reaches around him and rubs the fur between his fingers, his breath quickening. “Sky bison,” he whispers. Quickly he demands, “Where?”

No. Sky bison means Avatar, and Jet is not dealing with the kids and their scowly Waterbender again.

“Three days back,” Longshot volunteers before Jet can shush him. “They’re headed west. Like us.”

“There’s an Air Temple,” Li murmurs to himself.

Uh-uh. No way the kid’s taking himself to an elevated chasm without any wings attached.

“Out of the question,” Jet says by habit. As if Li is one of his Freedom Fighters to keep in line. 

Li shoots him a look that very clearly states, _I wasn’t asking you._

_My archer giving out bad advice makes this my business,_ Jet silently retorts. Forget freeing the half-starved tea shop brat. He wants the mopey dragon back.

“We’re going to the Air Temple already,” Smellerbee offers with a disinterested shrug. She’s held back from interacting with human Li, awkwardly observing from the sidelines as she picks feathers from Longshot’s badly repaired pillow.

Li the kid isn’t dumb, Jet will give him that. (There must’ve been some pretty heavy threats involved to keep him cowed in Ba Sing Se.) Gold eyes narrow thoughtfully before Li rasps, “Why?”

There are many answers to that question, none of which apply to a gold-eyed human who can’t fly.

Longshot shrugs. “Air currents.”

Clearly Li is not well-versed in the art of brevity. He blinks in brain-mangled consternation until Jet mercifully steps in as translator.

“Wings,” he says crisply, stretching his arms out to mimic a hawk.

If anything, Li looks even more lost. Definitely obtuse to anything but blatant facts.

“You seemed upset that you couldn’t fly,” Jet enunciates with careful precision. “We were taking you to the Air Temple to prove we weren’t holding you down.”

Like the callous slavers the draik obviously remembered, but Li refuses to talk about.

Flooding scarlet again (it’s a wonder his scales aren’t crimson, with all the blustering he does), Li splutters, “That wasn’t necessary!”

His eyes shift aside though, and his fists clench in memory, and Jet knows they made the right choice. Maybe the draik didn’t get it, but something in the subconscious made him paranoid of losing his freedom. 

“Look, we’re not going to ask questions,” Jet soothes, looking away disinterestedly until the kid relaxes. “Your past is your business. If you want to keep going west, though.... you’re welcome to tag along. I know we didn’t always agree in the past, but we’re all outsiders here. You fit right in with us.”

“As Li or Feng?” the kid snaps.

“Both,” Longshot pipes in, a little too eagerly. Jet shakes his head.

“Either,” he corrects. “We haven’t really met Li yet. I’d like to know what kind of fighter we’re incorporating into our group.”

“I didn’t say I was interested,” Li says gruffly, fists driving into his thighs. Grounding himself. Badly.

“I didn’t say we were taking volunteers,” Jet answers. “There’s only three of us now — there used to be more. You join this gang, you’re here because you want to live for something..... Unless 'tea service' is more fulfilling.”

It’s a dirty blow that earns him a scathing look from Longshot, but it makes the kid consider the hard questions.

“I’ll think about it,” Li grumbles, shoving his bare toes into the dirt. He looks sidelong at Jet and snaps, “That doesn’t mean I’ll fight for your cause.”

Jet inclines his head and shrugs. Sure, he’ll fuss about it for a little bit. Fighting is in the kid’s blood, though. Once he’s wrangled in, he’ll do whatever is necessary. It’ll just take a few nudges in the right direction.

“Your call,” Jet says amicably, while Smellerbee looks away uncomfortably. He stands and stretches, looking lazily around the camp. “We might as well get a move on. You’re welcome to travel with us until you make up your mind.”

Nodding jerkily, conflict melting into apprehension, Li rises and tags after Longshot, suddenly lost and puttering as the Freedom Fighters make quick work of the camp. He travels with them silently. Pushes on through “nap hour,” much to Longshot’s dragon-deprived dismay. Curls up on a spare blanket by the fire they have to arrange without their golden heater, muddled thoughts splayed all over his scarred face.

By morning, he’s gone. The tracks lead northeast. Jet had hoped the kid wouldn’t go back to the family who trashed him, but they couldn’t coax him away when he was a dragon — it won't do any good to reason with him now.

Longshot sits in the clearing, shoulders bowed in loss, and rubs the dragon charm until it’s faded with oil and salt. Touching the archer’s shoulder briefly, Jet nods east. 

“Come on. We’ve got a tea shop to burn.”

At least they can do that much for the kid.

* * *

It’s days before he finds Uncle again. He doesn’t know the terrain, but the dragon remembers the scents along the trail. He makes it in half the time it took him to wander so far. 

Iroh drops a teapot and nearly falls, caught at the last minute by a kind customer. Zuko helps him sit down, and somehow the loiterers get the hint and slowly meander out before tears are shed. Weathered hands bunch in Zuko’s shirt and he’s nearly strangled before Uncle lets go. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to go, I followed the soldiers and I couldn’t change back and I got lost along the way, but it’s the last time — I swear — I won’t let it happen again, I can control myself next time.....”

It’s the same apology he’s made a hundred times before. Agni knows it won’t change a thing, but Uncle grips his shoulder anyways and apologizes like it’s his fault Zuko wandered away.

“I should have known the time was close. We will show more caution next time — and I will be sure to bar the windows.”

He means it in jest, but something in Zuko’s chest clamps tight as another part of his freedom is shunted away. He nods, because what else are they to do, and lays awake on his own bed that night, shaking and twitching and trying to ignore the raging need to relax into himself and explore the adjoining rooms where blood-kin-named-Uncle has brought new trinkets and spices and incense. 

He stays awake until dawn, and resumes his duties in a haze. There’s tea for him that night, laced with something stronger than jasmine, and he drinks it without argument. Finishes the next shift with a dead feeling in his chest. He dreams of romps and stick fights and morning spats and white fur and healing water and sand underneath his claws. He serves tea and doesn’t react when the customers ask where he’s been (vacation at Lake Laogi, Iroh tells them, and they don’t ask any more questions), and he behaves because if he messes this up, he’ll go crazy wishing he’d stayed with a freewheeling band of insane people who rooted against the Fire Nation.

He doesn’t want to be a Freedom Fighter.

He can’t stand to be _Li_ any longer, either.

The fever takes him suddenly, and Iroh has to close the shop for nearly a week. Zuko remembers blazing heat and chills and searing memories of Avatar hunting and bison flying and stretching out with a troop of orphans on a lazy afternoon. Iroh tells him he flitted between forms, himself for one moment and a draik the next, sweating without relief and falling deeper into nightmares until it was impossible to discern the dragon’s eyes from the human’s. 

“You are fighting yourself,” Zuko remembers the words drifting between dreams. “You must decide who you are, and who you are meant to be.”

When it’s over, Zuko wakes up puddled in cold sweat, a sodden blanket draped across him like the heavy weight of his own wings. He shoves it aside with a grimace, startled when the simple gesture makes his arms shake.

“Four days,” Iroh informs him gravely. Four days of searching within and finding the answers that could not be taught by any scholar or circumstance. “You have wrestled within yourself and found what was lost.”

“I wasn’t lost....” Zuko argues uncertainly.

“You did not know yourself,” Iroh corrects him. “That is the same thing.”

They open the tea shop again, and Zuko realizes he hates it. Hates the apron strapped around his shoulders and the shoes confining his feet and the jasmine dulling his senses. It doesn’t take Uncle long to pick up on his restlessness.

“You want something more,” Iroh says with a worn sigh. “I’m sorry I have nothing to offer.”

“It’s fine,” Zuko says quickly. “I... like your shop.”

It’s not entirely a lie.

He doesn’t fool anyone.

Sharp triggers torment his inner sense. The splash of water from the fountain. A sudden breeze flapping under his collar. A cheeky brother teasing his younger sibling. He catches himself searching, sniffing the air, trying to find the scent of _stupid-awesome-fishing-brother_ or _hoppy-air-friend_ before remembering he left them behind for a reason.

He finds a faded poster for a missing bison, and the feelings well up so deep that he trembles in the empty shed for an hour, until his shoulders stop aching and he doesn't taste fire in the back of his throat.

He folds up the poster and pockets it, slipping out of the shed and heading for home. He knows where he has to go.

He leaves Uncle a note, so he won’t worry. Slits the back of his boots (maybe he won’t need them for long). Packs just enough that he won’t have to hunt right away.

He heads west.

Maybe he’s already too late. Maybe the Avatar’s on his way back to the Fire Nation by now. Maybe he’s found himself a Firebending teacher. It’s not anything new — Zuko’s always been two steps behind.

He skirts around the scents of bowstring and iron and wheat. Roosts in high places where he won’t catch the familiar taints should the transformation catch him unawares. Wakes disillusioned and sad, knowing he’s trading friends for the allies he knows he can trust... and shouldn’t... and wants to, anyways.

He wonders if he’ll ever stop feeling torn inside.

He finds the Avatar, and realizes there wasn’t any need to fear after all. Things have changed. He has, too.

He’s finally found what he was looking for all along.


End file.
